The Travesty of Edward Morgan Blake
by xCaligula
Summary: When you live your life like a joke, your memory becomes nothing but a travesty. Everyone knows only what they thought you to be, and never know who you were. Or, a backstory for the Comedian.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I have a shitton of headcanons involving Eddie and his life, and I guess now I'm going to try to put those ideas to paper. I'm not sure how long this story will be or how far I'll go with it, or if I'll even finish it. Right now, it would be an achievement to even make it through his time in the Minutemen, but we'll see. Hopefully I can write him a convincing and fleshed out life story while still keeping him the trashy man we know and love.**

"This is the third time this month something like this has happened."

"That's not really that many, when you think about it."

"The month started on Friday, Edward." It was hard not to laugh at the disapproving stare his mother gave him from across the kitchen table. "Today is Tuesday. I don't think your father will be very happy to hear about this either."

"Well, ya know, ya don't _have_ to tell him," said Edward Blake, who much preferred to go by Eddie.

His mother only glared at that and did not dignify it with a response. "You go up to your room and think about what you've done. Maybe if you pray on it till your father gets home, the good Lord will have some mercy on you."

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered, standing up and trudging up the stairs. He was fifteen years old, and nearly constantly in trouble at the all-boys Catholic school he attended. His parents were well-to-do, even given the current mess everyone was getting out of, where money was concerned, and they didn't take too kindly to his antics.

First of all, he barely took anything seriously, and it had taken a lot of string-pulling to get him to the current level of school he was in, given his grades. This frustrated his parents and teachers to no end, as any of them could tell that he was highly intelligent. When asked why he didn't try harder, he would feed them some line about the 'pressure currently plaguing in the school system' and then snicker as if he had just told the funniest joke in the world.

And then there was the matter of his temper. Whenever anyone did something make him mad- and there was almost always something to make him mad- it was nearly impossible for him to not fly off the handle, and this led to many a schoolyard fight, as well as him mouthing off in class and picking on anybody who had something that he wanted.

He was nothing but a punk, plain and simple, or at least that's what he was told, time and time again. His father barely looked at him anymore, and his mother was growing to resent him more each day. The unruly child was putting a strain on her marriage, and she had a busy social life during the weekdays; having to pick him up from school when he was in trouble interfered with that.

Eddie didn't know why either of them bothered. Why didn't they just leave him alone? He didn't like them and they didn't like him, so why couldn't they just butt out and let him do as he pleased? He was tired of everyone forcing their expectations on him when he couldn't give a damn either way. He hadn't asked for any of this, after all, and maybe they should have considered the fact that he might not want all this bullshit.

The fact was, he wasn't going to get anywhere different if he didn't leave. Living here meant more of the same, but, as big as Louisville was, his parents had social reach. He couldn't just disappear here, he would have to leave the city altogether. In fact, he would probably have to leave Kentucky altogether, and head somewhere else to start over. He often wondered if he could really do that; he was almost sixteen, after all, and that meant he was nearly an adult. If anyone could take care of themselves, he was positive that he could.

Maybe today would be the day he finally did it. It wouldn't be the first time he had seriously considered just packing up and slipping out the window before his father made it home to tell him what a disappointment he was, but every time he had not quite managed to convince himself before it was too late, and today was no different.

He heard the door open and close, he heard the hushed whispering of his mother as she delivered the news, and he heard the loud expletive from his father, who he was sure did not mention his frequent cursing in confession. Then he heard his least favorite part of the whole exchange, his father shouting, "Edward Morgan Blake, get your ass down these steps this minute!"

Eddie heaved a sigh before walking as slowly as possible down the stairs, as if the very weight of the task was nearly too much for him to bear. Perhaps if he pretended to be remorseful this time, the scolding would go quicker. Perhaps, but he was not very good at remorse, feigned or otherwise.

"What's this your mother tells me about you gettin' into another fight today?" he asked, glaring daggers at his son.

"I mean, I guess she's tellin' ya cos it's true," replied Eddie with an easy smirk that had earned him a fair amount of trouble in the past.

"Damn it, boy, I am tired of your smart mouth! And I'm even more tired of you always comin' home in some kind of trouble. I thought we raised ya better than that." When Eddie only chuckled at his father's words, he threw his hands up in frustration. "I don't know what to do with ya, boy! Your mother and I did everythin' we could for ya, puttin' ya in that fancy school, takin' ya to church every weekend. Don't you know ya have to answer for everything you do?"

"Yeah, but don't you have to answer for everything you do?" he asked, still smirking, still chuckling. "I mean, how are ya gonna explain all that 'unwholesome talk' ya got goin' on? Not to mention, I don't know if the good Lord in heaven likes drinkers or gossips too much, so I don't know how you and mom-"

He was not done with his little jab at their character, but his father must have been done hearing it or he would not have done what he did to stop Eddie from speaking. His father had never punched him before, had never resorted to any sort of physical violence with his son, but today, Eddie felt his father's fist connect with his jaw, and his head snapped to the side as his mother screamed.

"Michael! Should you really have-"

"That's enough from you, Mary," his father said. "You know just as well as I do that the brat is out of control. Maybe he needs a little sense knocked into him before he goes around disrespecting his parents."

Eddie rubbed his sore jaw, surprised, but not really surprised. Though his father had never hit him before, he couldn't say he hadn't suspected it was coming eventually. But, even if he knew it was coming, that didn't change the way things were. He was right about them and he knew he was; they just couldn't handle hearing the truth. They would never see that he was right about them, because they were too busy being afraid that they weren't the perfect people they pretended to be. They were so busy being afraid, in fact, that they had no time left to actually try to better themselves, and that thought struck him as so funny that he doubled over laughing.

"What the hell are you laughin' about?" his father asked, now even more enraged by the display in front of him. Eddie was still laughing too hard to speak, and said nothing. "Boy, you're insane. Go back upstairs, and don't even think about comin' back down until I say so!"

Eddie did as he was told, laughing all the way, and he sat in his room and laughed till his sides hurt. With his realization about his parents also came the resolve to do what he had always wanted to do. Maybe they were too busy being afraid to better themselves, but was he really much better? He was so busy thinking about how hard it would be to get away that he never bothered to try.

Tonight, that was going to change. As he listened to his parents eat dinner downstairs without him, he began to formulate a plan, and when he was sure that they were asleep, he packed up what belongings he thought he would need and slipped downstairs. He had only a change of clothes, a baseball bat from a very brief stint as an athlete, and his Bible and rosary. Why he thought to bring those, he could not say, but he felt that abandoning the church entirely when making such a big decision might not be the best idea.

He gathered up leftovers from his parents' meal, and then went to where he knew his father stashed extra money. There was more than enough to get him out of here, and hopefully keep him afloat until he could find income. Now all that was left was for him to get out of the city, and so he headed for the train station.

Soon, he would be boarding the next train to New York.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: This chapter is kind of slow with a lot of bullshit about his early days in the city, but the end of the chapter sees him finally beginning his career as a costumed adventurer. If anyone is wondering why I chose to have him from Louisville, it's pretty simple: I'm a Kentucky native myself, and that seemed like as good a city as any to be big, but not too big, and southern, but not too southern.**

 **A note about Eddie and religion: I've always headcanoned him as someone who was brought up Catholic. Now, as for his personal religion, I don't think he really has one. Obviously, he's a pretty bad person and never mentions having a faith, but I can see him as being the sort that thinks, because he was raised a certain way, that's his religion. Even if he never goes to church or prays or makes an attempt to follow the teachings, he still claims to be Catholic. I was raised in a Christian family, so I have a lot of relatives like that, and it just strikes me as something that he would do, especially given the time he grew up in and whatnot. Anyway, just wanted to let you guys know, in case you were afraid him keeping his Bible meant this story was going to have some spiritual journey bullshit.**

Eventually, Eddie made it to New York City. This was, he assumed, the best choice for anyone who was looking to start over and disappear, all at the same time. Many others had come to the city looking for more before him, and though many of them had failed, he wasn't going to let that happen to him. He was tough, and he would rather die here than return home to be his parents' lapdog for the rest of his life.

He spent his first day in the city looking for somewhere to live. The money he had stolen from his parents would be enough for a deposit, but it would not leave him much to eat off of, even if he went somewhere cheap, and he would have to go somewhere cheap.

His search eventually lead him to a rundown apartment building near the Hudson River, where the landlord's wife, running the place while her husband worked a second job, didn't ask too many questions after he winked and told her it would be a pleasure sharing a building with someone as beautiful as her. He had been mocked by more than one landlord for his slight accent, but here, his Southern charm benefited him.

After he was settled in to the small, dirty room, he thought about work. On his search for a home, he had snatched a newspaper out of a stranger's back pocket and now he studied the pages for employment opportunities. There weren't many of those, as job openings had been limited for a while, but he noticed a few calls for factory work that were looking for young, able-bodied men.

As he laid down to sleep that night, he hoped that at least one of those jobs would be willing to take him on. It had been a big step, leaving Louisville like that, but he was determined to make it work here. He had not come from a small town, but even a big city like Louisville looked small in comparison to New York, but, while most people would feel intimidated by that, he felt only confidence.

It was a big city, yes, but that just meant there was more, and more meant more for him to take and more for him to become. His factory job was just the start of something more, and even though he had no idea what he hoped to achieve someday, he decided then and there that it was going to be something big, and it was going to be something great.

~X~

It appeared that luck was on his side the next morning when the first job he inquired about hired him on the spot. They had been skeptical at first, given how skinny he was, but he was quick to reveal that that was just due to his height, and that he was much stronger than he looked. After he impressed them with his strength, he was given a uniform and sent to work.

His uniform was a simple yellow jumpsuit that was honestly quite awful looking, but that he couldn't help but find amusing. It was an ill fit, given his size, but he was so confident that this job would work out for him that he made plans to get it altered as soon as his first paycheck came in.

It was hard work, but he was quick to learn it and slow to lose his energy. Eddie put forth so much effort that day that he wondered why he had ever wasted his time in school when he could have been out, making a living, all along. When he got home that night, he fell asleep almost instantly, exhausted and content with where his travels had taken him.

But then the second day happened, and the third, and the fourth, and then he was a week into his job and perfectly miserable. Every day, it grew more mundane, and every day, he waited for someone to acknowledge how much better he was than the other boys who worked there, but nobody said a thing. He was treated like a nobody while he did his boring, menial job.

When he finally got the money to get his uniform altered, he wondered why he even cared about how it fit him anymore. Nobody noticed him, after all, and his job hardly seemed worth caring that much. He grew more and more frustrated with his life, until one day, that all came bubbling out.

Up until that point, he had really made an effort to keep his temper under control. Honestly, he had wanted nothing more than to leave that part of him behind when he left for the city, but one day, he simply could not hold back anymore. A foreman had walked past and made a comment about him needing to pick up the pace, even though he was ahead of schedule, even though he was faster than all of the other boys.

Eddie punched the foreman square in the jaw and was subsequently fired.

~X~

And so he had to look for a new job. In the meantime, he found it rather easy to get by stealing, grabbing food whenever he saw an opportunity and continuing to snatch newspapers while he looked for job openings. None of the factories that had been advertising before seemed to be looking anymore, and every day, the newspaper yielded no answers.

But, when he wasn't scouring the help wanted ads, he began to notice some very interesting stories popping up, starting with a hooded man stopping a crime. These instances became more and more frequent until this Hooded Justice was all over the news. Not long after, he was followed by a man calling himself Nite Owl.

At first, the entire notion seemed silly, dressing up in costumes and running around like that, but he could not deny that there was something fun about the idea. With your identity concealed like that, it didn't matter how silly you looked. You could do just about anything you wanted; that idea certainly appealed to him.

But he had more important things to worry about than super hero games. Eventually, he found another factory opening and, like before, he was hired fairly quickly. This time, he had no illusions of success and did not care that his uniform- this time a gray jumpsuit- was much too baggy. He just showed up to work, swallowed him temper, did his job, and went home.

It was hard for him to carry on like that, and every day he considered calling it quits and giving up even though he knew that was not an option. He didn't want to admit that things had been easier back home, but they had. His relationship with his parents had never been a very good one, but he had never had to work or want for anything when he lived with them, and even though he got in trouble often, he never had to worry about bottling up his frustrations like he did now.

He had tried to keep his stealing exclusive to what he needed to get by, only allowing a newspaper to be snatched here or there because they were over-priced to begin with, in his opinion, but as time went on, the appeal grew. It was one way to reduce his frustrations, at least; getting a little extra here or there without having to pay, nabbing somebody's wallet so he had money left over for luxuries, all of it was rather nice, but it didn't ease his troubles for long.

The fact of the matter was, he was a violent boy by nature. When things did not go the way he liked, throwing punches was always his first response. He wasn't happy when he wasn't pounding someone's face in on a nearly daily basis. Nothing else helped him blow off steam like that. He had tried sports in school, and that had failed; pickpocketing strangers would certainly fail as well. Eddie needed something to work out his temper on, or he would surely snap on the job again.

And then one night, the idea came to him. He had settled in to read the paper, wondering if looking for a new job would help or if there even were any new jobs to look for, when he had spotted an article featuring yet another costumed adventurer. This one was, surprisingly enough, a woman who called herself the Silhouette.

It seemed so obvious then. Every night, these weirdos would dress up and get to beat up on whatever criminals they happened to run into. He remembered his realization about how beneficial having their identity concealed could be and the freedom that he had assumed would come along with that. All he would need was a mask and an alias, and he could do the same thing.

After all, it seemed even girls were doing it now!  
~X~

A mask was not difficult to obtain, though he had not been able to decide on a good alias for himself. He figured that could come later, and put all of his focus on his costume. It couldn't be anything too extravagant, which meant it would be easier to make it from things he had at home. The only clothes he owned, however, were his two pairs from home, his current work uniform, and his old work uniform.

And then the idea hit him. He had put so much into that old uniform, getting it altered to fit his measurements and all. It was a shame that it sat on his floor now, completely useless. It wold take a little bit of modification to make it really suit the image he was going for, but that was okay. It would do for now.

After deciding that was what he would wear, he went around to a few shops, looking for his mask. He decided on a purple domino mask, and picked up a belt with a red jester face on the buckle while he was at it. He had never seen anything like it before, and couldn't resist adding it to the costume.

With all of that together, he was ready to take on the streets. The area he lived in wasn't the best, and he was sure that he could find criminals hiding all over the place just outside his apartment building. But for his first public bust, he wanted something big, something that would get him in the papers too.

After only a few days of snooping around after work, he found what he was looking for in the form of a small, up-and-coming gang that were looking to cash in on drugs in the neighborhoods along the river. A group of that size would certainly attract attention for Eddie as well as give him a lot of heads to bash, but with how new and inexperienced they were, they would also be easy targets.

Taking his baseball bat with him, he went one night for his attack. The first few thugs went down without much effort, but once it was known that there was a kid in a yellow suit running around, he was swarmed by the others. Still, he kept his wits about him, channeling all of the pent-up frustration he had felt since starting his new life in New York.

"What the hell are you tryin' to prove, kid?" one of the men asked, swinging for a hit. Either most of these men weren't armed, or they were afraid of shooting a kid, or a little bit of both.

Eddie blocked this man's punch with ease, throwing him off. "I'm not tryin' to prove, anything!" he declared, trying his best to sound like a noble hero. "I'm just here to clean up the streets and make the world a safer place for...for..." He burst into laughter. No matter how he tried to keep a straight face, he could not take himself seriously when he said things like that. It was so cheesy it hurt, and he knew that keeping the city safe had nothing to do with this.

It took a lot of effort to stop laughing once he had started, and even as he continued fighting, he would sometimes let a few chuckles slip. It was just too damn funny, the way he had tried to play the hero like that. He was a lot of things, and he was out here in a costume and mask, but he was most definitely not the typical hero.

"Who the hell are you?" asked the terrified boss, when Eddie had taken down every single one of his thugs singlehandedly. His hand trembled as he reached for a gun, but he was shaking so much that he dropped it. Eddie kicked it away and laughed.

The man tried to play it tough, even knowing that he had lost. "Really, who are you supposed to be?" he asked. "The Funnyman or somethin'?"

Eddie paused to consider this. He really did need a name, and it was true that he had a hard time taking things seriously, that he turned a lot of things into jokes that others might not see that way. In fact, the more he pondered it, the more he realized that most everything felt like a joke to him anymore.

"Close, but not quite," he said with a grin. "I'm the Comedian."

 **A/N: Next chapter will introduce the Minutemen, which means oh shit, I get to explore how I think things were with Sally. Also going to give him a friendship with Bill, because I feel like if anyone out of the group would be able to tolerate him, Bill seems the most likely.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: In this chapter, the Minutemen are introduced. I suppose now should be the time I confess to having read the Before Watchmen: Minutemen story, and also confess to liking it. I might be borrowing some ideas from it for this story (such as it being like an audition), but there's also plenty about it I didn't think would have happened (I like the story, but it doesn't line up with my headcanons), so I'll deviate from it plenty.**

Weeks passed and Eddie soon made the news as the Comedian. Before him had come some flying man in Connecticut called Mothman, and after came someone called Captain Metropolis, but Eddie remained the only one taking out criminals on the waterfront.

He was known all over for his brutality and efficiency, as well as his rather tacky costume. After a short time, he got a few alterations made, including purple, diamond shaped buttons in place of the black, round ones it had come with, and a tall, purple collar. It had been hard to find durable purple gloves in his size, and even harder to find purple boots, but he managed, and considered his costume complete.

He loved his "night job", and found that it made work at the factory at least slightly more tolerable. It was great, having a place he could blow off steam and be as violent as he pleased, and the best part was, he was praised for it! The papers called him a hero, and nobody scolded him for picking fights like they had back home. It seemed he had found the perfect job.

When Silk Spectre entered the scene, things were a bit different. She had no secret identity, openly known as an up-and-coming model named Sally Jupiter, and it was clear that everything she did was for publicity. Not long after her, a bank started using a man called Dollar Bill to promote their security.

There were some that would criticize them for using their costumes to make money, but Eddie didn't care one way or the other. Everyone had their reasons, he figured, and it wasn't like his was particularly wholesome. Not to mention the fact that Silk Spectre was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen, and he didn't mind getting to look at that in the papers. He would be lying if he said he didn't save a few of her better photos when he had the chance.

The area was slowly overtaken by the super hero bug, and more surfaced every day. Few were successful, and from what Eddie observed, most were gone from the public view within a few days time. He was one of the few that stayed prominent, and he had no intention of quitting any time soon. As the Comedian, things were better for him than they had been in a while.

Every day, he scanned the papers for any mentions of himself or the others he had taken an interest in (Sally Jupiter, in particular), and it was while doing this that he happened upon a wanted ad that called specifically for costumed adventurers to come forward. It was asking for those interested in forming a group to meet up.

At first, Eddie wasn't too sure about something like that. He had done just fine on his own, after all, and had never needed an entourage before. However, there was an advantage to numbers, and he would get to experience a lot more if he did join this group. Not to mention, the ad was said to have been put out by Captain Metropolis and Silk Spectre. Knowing that she was going to be there was enough to encourage him to at least make an appearance.

~X~

When he arrived at the designated meeting place, he found that it was being run more like an audition. There was a line of several nobodies, all of them going in and out to get to meet with the two who had placed the ad in the paper. Eddie caught glimpes of a few of the people he had seen in the papers, and wondered how many of them would make it. It was then that he wondered if he would make it, and then he began to wonder when he started caring about this whole ordeal.

Eventually, his turn came, and he strode into the room, hoping he looked as confident as he always did. And there she was, just as beautiful as she looked in the photographs. Sally Jupiter smiled up at him, batting her lashes. God, what he wouldn't give to have a woman like that.

He managed to tear his eyes away from her long enough to give Captain Metropolis a once-over, and was significantly less impressed. Then Eddie turned his attention to the man in a suit standing behind them. He hadn't ever seen this guy before, but he figured he must be pretty official to be dressed like that.

"Hello, my name is Laurence Schexnayder," the man spoke. "I am Miss Jupiter's manager and have been assisting Captain Metropolis in the formation of this group, which we hope to call the Minutemen. And you are?"

"The Comedian," said Eddie, smirking at the older man. "Pleasure to meet ya, Larry."

"I've heard of you," said Captain Metropolis. "You're the man that's been taking out criminals on the Hudson with a baseball bat, right?"

"That would be me," he replied, grinning proudly. The Captain looked just as impressed with Eddie as Eddie was with him.

"Are you sure someone like him would be good for our image?" Larry asked.

"That's exactly what I'm wondering myself," replied Captain Metropolis.

"Well, _I_ think he's a good choice," said Sally, winking. Eddie actually felt himself blush, something that he hadn't done in a while. "He's cute."

"Oh, come on, Sally," her agent said, "you can't be serious. I mean, he's a total thug, and let's not forget the matter of his age. He's practically a child."

Eddie, who knew he looked older than he was, knew he was just saying this to get a reaction out of him. "Watch who you're callin' a kid, huh?"

"How old are you?" asked Larry, in a mocking voice. "Thirteen?"

He had to remind himself that losing his temper now would only give the agent what he wanted, which was an excuse to not let Eddie into the group. He tried to keep his calm as he replied, "Sixteen, actually." His birthday had come and gone rather unceremoniously.

"See, just like I said. He's just a kid."

"That _is_ rather young for a group like this," Captain Metropolis said as he considered it.

"Come on, boys, let's not be too hasty," Sally spoke up. "He's not that much younger than me, after all! And anyway, I like him, and I say he's in."

There was a silence that followed, as the two men stared pleadingly at Sally. She didn't look willing to compromise, and Eddie felt incredibly grateful to her. He had come in here thinking that none of this mattered, but now knew that he wanted to be a part of this team for reasons he could not explain. And he really wanted to get to spend more time with the lovely lady vouching for him.

"Are you sure?" asked Larry at last.

"Positive," she replied.

He sighed. Captain Metropolis nodded before saying, "Very well. Comedian, if you would wait outside until we've finished interviewing the rest of the applicants."

"Sure thing," said Eddie, and as he walked out of the room, Sally winked at him again. This time, he winked back.

~X~

When the Minutemen began meeting formally, Eddie was not surprised that the group insisted entirely of the heroes he had found to be most notable in the news. It was him, Sally, Captain Metropolis, Nite Owl, Hooded Justice, the Silhouette, Mothman, and Dollar Bill.

Eddie had a rocky start with the group, to say the least. In comparison to the rest of them, he was reckless and impulsive, and often needlessly brutal. He was often treated like the child they all he thought he was, particularly by Nite Owl, Hooded Justice, and Captain Metropolis. Mothman irritated Eddie with how nervous he was, and the Silhouette barely looked his way, not that he minded. His attention was completely focused on another woman.

Sally had remained just as friendly with him since the group had formed, always taking the time to talk with him and laugh at his jokes. He had next to no experience with women after all his time in a boys' school, but there was definitely something special about her. She was nicer to him than anyone had ever been, and he found himself starting to like her for more than just her unrivaled beauty.

Besides her, he considered Dollar Bill to be a fairly good friend. He, at least, didn't treat Eddie like a kid, and wasn't too hard on him about his methods. Bill wasn't a natural fighter, considering he'd gotten his start in this gig as an actor, but he had been an athlete in school and was tough enough to keep up.

Even without an ounce of violence in him, he didn't look down on Eddie for that, or at least didn't do so openly. He respected him like an equal and talked to him like a friend, and if it weren't for Sally, Eddie would consider Bill his closest friend. But Sally was definitely the one he felt the closest to, even if Larry didn't take too kindly to them spending so much time together.

Though he had a hard time fitting in with the group, Eddie still loved it. He loved being a part of something like that and going out together to take on the bigger names in crime, to get to fight actual villains instead of petty thugs on the street. When they were fighting together, it didn't matter what his teammates thought of him; all that mattered was them getting the job done.

 **A/N: Don't worry, Eddie will fuck things up with Sally soon enough. Just had to establish a proper relationship for them beforehand so that it can be a bit more understandable when she eventually forgives him.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: This chapter is gonna read like a love story, but we all know it can't stay that way for long, because this is Eddie we're talking about, and Sally, and the Minutemen.**

Of course, Eddie's affection for Sally only grew over time, and the more time he spent trying to win her over, the more he became convinced that she was just as interested and that all he had to do was make his move. He knew he wasn't imagining her giggles when he said something funny or the way she would bat her lashes at him. She was a flirt, but he couldn't help but think things were special with him.

He found out that was nineteen, just three years older than him, and he let her know his real name and said it was fine for her to call him that whenever they were alone. They were friends, and he loved that, but he couldn't wait for the day when they turned into something more.

"She's real special," he would say to Bill.

"Of course she is," his friend would reply, unfazed by the potentially blooming romance. "She's a celebrity, remember?"

"Not like that. I mean, she's special to me, ya know?"

And then Bill would inevitably tease him about going after older women, and the dangers of flirtation, and all sorts of other things, and they would have a good laugh about it. It was nice to know, at least, that Bill was not competition, and that he was not jealous of the time they spent together like Eddie knew Larry was.

~X~

As the year drew to a close and Christmas approached, Sally suggested they have a party for the holidays. Captain Metropolis and Nite Owl were both enthusiastic about it and set to planning while Larry saw to obtaining a camera so that he could take some photos of the party for publicity.

Eddie, who still had the same mundane factory job, began saving what he could to buy Sally a nice Christmas present. He figured she deserved it for being so nice to him and all, and maybe that would be the proper opening to pursue their relationship. He wasn't exactly sure what to get a girl like her, but he figured something would come to him, and, soon enough, he found a pair of pearl earrings that he was sure she would love.

When the day of the party came, he kept the earring box in his pocket, waiting for the chance to get her alone. Everyone seemed to be in good spirits and nobody bickered; everyone was getting along, for once. The night was going well for the whole group, and even Hooded Justice was a bit more talkative than usual. Eddie supposed he was drunk, but that was alright; it was Christmas Eve and even he had had a bit that night despite his age.

"Havin' fun?" he asked Sally, walking over to her. She had been in a conversation with Nite Owl for a while, while Eddie had been chatting with Bill, subtly watching and waiting for the chance to approach her.

"Of course!" she said, laying a hand on his arm as she did so. She smiled warmly at him. "It's such a lovely night and everyone's having so much fun!"

"Yeah, well, ya had a good idea," he replied. "Not surprisin', though. You're pretty good at a lot of stuff."

She swatted his arm playfully and laughed. "Oh, cut it out! Flattery gets you nowhere, you know!"

"S'gottin' me plenty of places before," he replied with a smirk, leaning in.

"Watch out, lovebirds," a deep voice said, and they looked up to see HJ looming over them, mistletoe in hand. He was most definitely drunk, but that appeared to be working in Eddie's favor.

He grabbed Sally by her arms and started to pull her in for a kiss when he was interrupted by Captain Metropolis shouting, "Everyone hold your poses!" He had been fiddling with the camera for a while and was ready to take their photo. Sally pulled away from Eddie a bit so that she was visible, and the two grinned while they waited for the flash.

When the picture had been taken, Sally pulled away from his embrace to rub at her eyes, and HJ vanished to talk with Captain Metropolis. The mood had passed, and Eddie wasn't sure if it would be possible to reclaim it. Unless, of course, he played his ace a little early.

"Say, Sal," he said, stopping her before she could walk away, "I wanted to give ya somethin'. Just a little Christmas present, since you're such a good friend and all..."

"Oh, Eddie, you really shouldn't have," she said, her voice playful.

"Yeah, well, I did anyway," he replied, pulling out the small box and handing it to her. She opened it and gasped, looking up at him with surprise on her face.

"Why, these are...they're so beautiful!" she said, turning her attention back to the earrings. "How did you get these for me? They must have been expensive."

"Oh, it was no big deal," he said modestly, shrugging. "Just saved up a little bit, is all. But you're worth it, ya know?"

"That's so sweet of you," she said, and leaned up to give him a light kiss on the cheek. It wasn't the long, passionate kiss he had been hoping for when they had been under the mistletoe, but it was more than good enough.

The rest of the night, Sally hung off of Eddie as she drank more and more. Her affection became less subtle, and he knew that anyone looking at them would be able to tell that there was something going on between them. He was pleased to see Larry glaring at him a few times, and even noticed Bill giving him a thumbs up. It was the best night of his life.

Just before Sally was about to head home, he caught her and finally gave her that kiss he had been planning on. She giggled and stumbled out with Larry following, and Eddie waved goodbye. It had taken alcohol and some very expensive earrings to do it, but he was sure that they had finally managed to start their relationship.

~X~

Christmas passed, and a few days after, the team got together for their usual meeting. Eddie sometimes had to be late, due to his job, but he had barely been able to contain his excitement about seeing Sally over the past few days and cut out a little bit early, consequences be damned. He couldn't wait to see her again.

But when he walked into the room, she was hanging off of Hooded Justice's arm, laughing at something he'd said and giving him the same eyes she'd given Eddie at the Christmas party, and he didn't get it. He didn't understand why Sally, _his_ girl, was treating some other guy like that.

But he didn't say anything. Even though he wanted to yell and rave and throw punches, he didn't say a damn thing. He just sat in his usual seat and kept his eyes trained to the floor. To say that he was humiliated would be an understatement. He was positively mortified, and he was sure that everyone else could tell.

After all, they had all seen the way he and Sally were at the party. And now, here she was, treating HJ the same way. Everyone would see them together now and see how disappointed Eddie was, and know that he had been played for a fool, that he had honestly thought he had a chance with Sally.

As he sat there, silent for the duration of the meeting, his shame started to fade as his anger grew. It wasn't his fault that Sally had led him on like that. It wasn't fair for anyone to think that Eddie was a fool; they would have fallen for her charms the same as anyone else. For all he knew, she playing Hooded Justice just the same.

Anger was a good response. Anger was something he knew how handle. Shame and sadness were not, and so he focused on his anger with Sally, with the situation that she had put him in. He had to know what was going on. By the time the meeting had ended, he decided he was going to have a discussion with HJ.

He walked out with everyone, clenching his fists and trying to keep his breathing level as Sally pecked HJ's cheek- over top of his hood, which Eddie would have laughed at, had he not been resisting the urge to rip both of their face's off. He hung back outside, pleased to see that HJ had not left with the others. Once he knew that everybody else was gone, he would go in after him and ask him what was going on.

His mind drifted to various scenarios, all of them ending with him making some pun just before he pulled the noose around HJ's neck tight enough to kill him, or pounding his face in, or snapping his neck. He was so distracted by these thoughts that he lost track of who all exited the building, but soon, he was sure that all were gone except for Hooded Justice.

Slipping quietly back into their headquarters, he paused when he heard hushed voices. It seemed that he had missed someone in his count, and tried to remember who he had seen and who he hadn't. He approached the source of the voices noiselessly, peeking through a crack in a door to see Captain Metropolis.

"Are you sure everyone's gone?" the man asked.

"I'm sure," replied Hooded Justice.

"I mean, are you absolutely sure?" He sounded nervous. Paranoid.

"I said that I was sure and I meant it." HJ sounded irritated. "If you keep asking me, I'm going to have to punish you. In fact, I think I'll do that anyway. On your knees."

 _What the hell is this?_ Eddie thought, watching the two men with shocked interest. He already had a few ideas about what this scene could be, but he could hardly believe that these two men, of all people, would be doing something like that.

Captain Metropolis, despite being threatened with punishment, looking all too pleased, all to _eager_ to do as he was told and dropped to the floor. HJ waved his hand as if to say, 'get on with it', and the blonde man nodded, tugging on HJ's tights and pulling them down just enough to free his already hard member.

His mouth slowly parted, inching forward to meet his cock,and Eddie turned away before he could witness what was obviously about to occur. He hurried away, trying to remain as quiet as before, and tried to process exactly what he had just seen. It was not until he was back in his own apartment that he allowed himself to burst out laughing.

"I can't fuckin' believe it!" he said to himself, howling with laughter. "Those two are...oh, Jesus Christ, this is too good!"

When he had recovered from his fit of laughter and caught his breath, he was able to think a bit more on the subject. It was a hilarious and interesting discovery, but it shed no more light on the Sally situation. Why was Hooded Justice seeing her if he was already seeing Captain Metropolis? Did she know about what was going on or was she being tricked?

Eddie almost sympathized with her for that before he remembered the way she had looked at HJ at the meeting and remembered that he felt tricked himself. Besides her involvement, he wondered how this would affect the rest of the team. He had not been to church since running away from home, had not touched his Bible, and had nearly completely forgotten how to pray the rosary, but he knew what he had been taught about homosexuality. Should men like that be allowed to run around with other men, protecting the city?

As much as he hated the idea, he knew he would have to talk to Larry about this. He was the only person who could do anything about it, and the most logical person to approach about the subject. The next day, Eddie would meet with him. They had all been given his phone number in case of emergency, and he planned to call and schedule a meeting first thing.

~X~

When he walked into the diner that he had agreed to meet Larry at, he felt incredibly out of place in the loud yellow outfit and mask, but he wasn't sure if he was supposed to reveal his identity to the other man or not. He had no idea how much he could be trusted, after all.

"Alright, let's hear what this is all about," said Larry, looking impatient. "I've got more important meetings after this, so go on, out with it."

"Hooded Justice," said Eddie. "I saw him. Last night, I saw him with Captain Metropolis and they were-"

Larry laughed. "What? Do you wanna describe it in detail for me? How long did you watch them go at it?"

He blinked, letting the older man's words sink in. "Ya mean you _knew_ about them?" he asked.

"Of course I did, kid. I know everything that goes on in this little group. I knew it was only a matter of time before everyone else started catching on, though I have to admit I'm surprised you were the first to figure it out on your own," said Larry. "You're pretty observant, kid."

"But...but..." Eddie stammered. "He and Sally...yesterday they were..."

Larry laughed even harder at that. "Oh, so you're telling me you haven't figured that one out, smart guy? I told you, I knew it was only a matter of time before everyone else caught on. If even a Bible-thumping, do-gooder like Dollar Bill could believe his teammates were doing that, imagine how long it would take for the public to figure it out. Our image would be ruined!

So I had to do something to delay that, at least for as long as I could. So, after the Christmas party, I had a little chat with Sally, and she agreed to pose as his girlfriend to help things along. I told her she couldn't tell anyone about it, or it might ruin the authenticity. Of course, you understand, right?"

"Oh, I understand," snarled Eddie. He thought about clocking this creep right here and now, but he refrained. It would be a temporary satisfaction, but it wouldn't fix the problem and the diner was too public. No, something like this required more work than a simple punch, and, though he may be a fighter, that did not mean that he could not see the better alternative.

"Be seein' ya," he said, getting up to leave.

"Of course," replied Larry. "I hope you enjoyed our little chat as much as I did."

~X~

"Can you believe that slimy bastard?" asked Eddie. "I mean, how can he just _use_ her like that?"

"That is terrible," said Bill. "Poor Sally...not to mention the fact that he's trying to cover up something so terrible. I can't believe Captain Metropolis, of all people..."

"And you know he's doing it for double the reward. He gets to protect his pressure image and he's keepin' me away from Sally. Ya shoulda seen the eyes he was givin' us at the party. It's no coincidence he decided to ask her right after!"

"I'm sorry that happened," his friend consoled, "but I'm not sure if there's anything you can do now but wait."

"Oh, hell no," he replied, chuckling. "I'm not exactly good at that. But what I _am_ good at is gettin' even, and what better way than to win her back? Trust me, I'm gonna figure out exactly what I gotta do to make Sally mine again, and then I'm gonna expose those queers, and then I'm gonna tell everyone what Larry did."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Of course it's a good idea!" he said. "I'm not gonna lose, not now. I was so close to winnin', I'm not lettin' that pass me by again."

"It's just..." Bill sighed. "I'm getting concerned for how you're talking about Sally. You're not acting like she's a person anymore, just a trophy. All this talk of winning and losing...you sound like my old football teammates, and not in a good way. It's not a competition, if you really care about her. You need to respect her more."

Eddie scoffed. "Whatever. S'not like you have any idea what you're talkin' about anyway. I still care about Sally plenty. I respect her plenty. I just don't like other people takin' what's mine, is all."

Again, Bill sighed.

 **A/N: Uh oh, looks like we're finally catching glimpses of how gross our main character is. Next chapter, I think you all know what's coming. Looks like my archive warnings will be changing.**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: You guys know what's coming in this chapter. Warning for rape and violence. Also, I want you to know that this story is from Eddie's perspective. I don't believe Sally was faking her no, but Eddie did and that's why he went for it. So I'm not saying she didn't mean it, that's just how he sees it.**

After his revelation, Eddie went back to treating Sally the same way he always did, and didn't care who saw him flirting with her. He would do it in front of Hooded Justice and he would do it in front of Larry, and he didn't give a damn if either of them had a problem with it. She was going to be his sooner or later, after all; they might as well get used to the idea now.

He was pleased to see that she had started wearing the earrings he had given her every day, and thought that that must be a good sign. That, and the fact that she did not resist any of his flirtations, and kept up her usual routine of touching his arm when they talked and batting her lashes and laughing a bit too hard at all of his jokes. It was so clear to him that she was still interested and was just waiting for him to make another move.

The problem was the move itself. He wasn't going to have another romantic opportunity like the Christmas party again, and getting Sally alone was a challenge. It was hard to tell when he should strike or how he should do it, and he grew impatient as he waited for his opening.

Every time they went out fighting crime, he stuck by Sally's side, showing off his strength and lending her a hand whenever he could. Despite getting her start as a model, she was surprisingly resilient and could put up quite a fight, all in heels. Eddie would have liked to swoop in and save her more, but she was more capable than she looked.

So all that left for him to do was show how strong and capable he was, to fight as boldly as he could and impress Sally. There were many times he got himself into tough spots on purpose, just to fight his way out and make himself look cunning. Of course, to manipulate the situation that much made him all the more cunning than anyone could tell.

"You need to be more careful," said Mothman to him, after one of his stunts. "You need to be less reckless. You could get yourself killed..."

"Yeah? Speak for yourself," Eddie replied with a snort. "Don't forget I'm younger than the rest of ya, in better shape. I can pull off more than ya, and I'm gonna last longer than ya."

He said things like that often, always pointing out his age like it was a benefit, never giving anyone the chance to get the drop on him and make a joke about him being too young for this. He always stayed on top of things, reminding them that they would be the first to go, that he would be the one to bury them. The Comedian couldn't let others get to the punchline first, especially not when he was the joke in question.

~X~

While he was plotting to win over Sally, he was also plotting his exposure of Hooded Justice and Captain Metropolis. He didn't like to watch them in the act; he felt grossed out just knowing what they were doing, and so he never spied on them for long, but he still looked. Whenever he had the chance, he would peek in on them, just to make sure they were still at it, that he still had something on them.

What he saw when he watched them grew more horrifying each time. Sometimes it didn't even seem like they were sleeping together, it only seemed like HJ was beating Metropolis up. But then he saw the look in Metropolis' eyes, heard HJ's breathing grow labored, and he knew.

They _liked_ that sort of thing, HJ liked hurting Metropolis and Metropolis liked getting hurt. As fucked up as that seemed, Eddie could almost relate. After all, he enjoyed hurting people quite a bit himself, but it wasn't something he did for sexual pleasure, it was something he did for another sort of gratification. He could never imagine himself hurting Sally like that and enjoying it.

Either way, this only opened his eyes to the situation even more, only gave him more of an insight to how sick his teammates were. Once he had won Sally over, he would have plenty to say about their little secret meetings. Maybe when Metropolis was gone, Larry would be so ashamed of what he did that he would leave too, and Eddie could take over the Minutemen.

He and Sally could lead the group together, like a power couple. The thought made him grin.

~X~

Time went on, and Eddie grew more impatient, waiting for the chance to strike. He wanted Sally more than he could possibly say; he wanted her to be his, he wanted to have her, he couldn't stand waiting another day. And then, one day, his chance came to him.

It had been a special occasion. Larry had set up a photography session with a real photographer, and the group had been posing all day. Nite Owl had ended up handling it, because Larry had had to leave at some point, though. Already, Eddie was starting to consider this a good opportunity, what with Larry being gone.

They all posed, holding still for much too long, and Eddie started thinking about how he might approach Sally once this was all over. If he could get her alone today, he might finally be able to secure things. He could nearly taste his victory, it felt so close at that moment. The only question was, how would he do it?  
Finally, the flash came and the photo took. He heard Sally squeal behind him, as she often did when faced with camera flash, and he wondered how someone who wanted to be a model could still not be used to that. "Okay, that's it!" the photographer said. "Nice picture, folks!"

"We can move? I can finally scratch my armpit?" Eddie quipped. Behind him, Sally shuffled, bumping against him a bit.

"Ooh, I've got spots in my eyes," she said with a giggle.

He stood up to face her, leaning in as if inspecting and reaching for her. "Really? Lemme take a look an' see if I can fish 'em out for ya!"

She slapped his hand away and laughed. "Oh, Eddie, give me a break!" She had slipped up with saying his real name in front of the others before, but if anyone had noticed, they hadn't said anything, and he didn't really mind.

To his frustration, she took off after Hooded Justice and grabbed his arm as she said, "Boy! Real photo sessions! Do you think my hair will come out looking okay, HJ?"

If she had asked Eddie, he would have fed her some line about putting all the other girls to shame, or something to that extent, but HJ's response was, "Frankly, Sally, I don't go in for all this razzle dazzle. I'd rather be on the streets, doing my job."

Eddie rolled his eyes at that, though, of course, they didn't see him. He sped up a little bit to try to join in their conversations. "Streets nothing! Why don't Uncle Sammy get us into Europe, where the real action is?" With all the political unrest overseas, crime fighting had started to seem a little boring.

"Well, firstly, we aren't at war," replied HJ. "Secondly, we should avoid political situations." He spoke in a condescending voice, as if Eddie were too young and stupid to really understand.

The Silhouette, who was standing nearby, looked over and smirked as she said, "Perhaps the Poles thought so too. You agree, Sally?" Eddie had noticed her making remarks like this to Sally, and had noticed Sally's defensive replies. It had not taking much observation to realize that Sally must be Polish and trying to hide that, and it had taking even less observation to figure out that these two women did not get along very well.

But Eddie had observed something else about Silhouette that he wondered if the others knew. It had been a chance encounter on the streets, but she was not hard to recognize out of costume, and he had followed her for a little bit out of curiosity. He had spotted the other women, then, and was able to figure out that this HJ and Captain Metropolis were not the only homosexuals on the team. He wondered, if she didn't hate Sally so much, would Silhouette be interested in her?

As predicted, Sally went defensive and said, "Well, I'm sure _I_ wouldn't know anything about what the _Polish_ people think." He nearly cringed, her response was so obvious. It was hardly even a secret anymore.

Mothman walked up behind him, his wing nudging Eddie to the side. "Me, I hope we keep out of it. Just _thinking_ about war, it scares me..."

"Hey, watch with the wings!" Eddie snapped.

"Come on, what's all this discord I hear?" asked Nite Owl, coming over and placing hands on Eddie and HJ's shoulders. "Meeting's over! Listen, everyone, meet in the lobby in five. We'll go back to the owl's nest for a beer."

Sally separated herself from the men, picking up her bag. "Fine, you guys go ahead. I gotta change." Eddie looked over at her and she threw him a wink when she noticed. His heartbeat picked up speed, the implications of her doing that.

This was it! This was his way in! If that wasn't an invitation, he didn't know what was. She wanted him to hang back with him, she wanted him to follow her. She wanted him. It was his big chance, and he hung back from the rest, watching as they all filtered out of the room.

Bill looked back at him and frowned, shaking his head. Eddie merely smirked back and waved. So what if Bill didn't approve of what he was doing? He clearly didn't understand how these things worked. Eddie understood how it worked, and that was why he was the one about to get Sally and Bill didn't even have a girlfriend, from what he could tell.

Sally had gone into the trophy room to change and Eddie slipped on after her, hanging in the doorway for a moment, entranced. She was down to her underwear, and he had never seen a woman in such a state of undress in person before. Sally looked so goddamn gorgeous, and he felt himself growing incredibly aroused as he watched her. Finally, he decided to speak up and said, "Hi."

Whirling around, she pulled her dress up to cover herself and said, "Eddie, what the hell are you doing in here? You knew I was changing." She looked annoyed, but only slightly, and he chuckled. Playing hard to get, huh?  
"Sure I did," he said. "You announced it loud enough." Sally made no move to get away as he crossed to room. "C'mon, baby," he murmured, trying to sound as confident as possible. He had been, at first, but he really had no experience with taking things this far, and he wanted to cover his inexperience. "I know what you need. You gotta have some reason for wearin' an outfit like this, huh?" He snatched the dress from in front of her to emphasize and pulled her close to him.

"E-Eddie, no..." mumbled Sally, trying to pull away. He had to laugh again as she kept up her little facade.

"Sure, no. Spelled Y-E-" He did not have the chance to finish his sentence, as Sally wrenched a hand free and clawed at his cheek.

"Spelled N! O!" she snapped, digging her nails into his skin.

Eddie felt a sharp pain where she had scratched, and a damp warmth spreading down. She had drawn blood! Sally had scratched him hard enough to draw blood, and that did not classify as playing hard to get. Sally had winked at him and then rejected him and she had fucking hurt his face, and she had lead him on and he snarled.

"Eddie?" she asked, backing away, looking nervous. His fist connected with her stomach and she fell back. He pulled her back up and punched her in the jaw, noticing her pearl earrings as he did so. This only made him more angry, knowing that she had accepted that expensive gift from him just to scratch his face hard enough to draw blood. She hit the floor and he kicked her in the stomach, once, twice, three times.

She rolled over on her stomach and he dropped down on top of her to stop her from crawling away. "Oh no," she moaned, her voice gurgling from the blood that had risen in her mouth. "Oh, no, Eddie, don't...oh God..."

Eddie reached for his belt, struggling to unfasten it with one hand while he held her head down with the other. He had to use the other hand to unfasten his pants, and when he had then undone, he realized, suddenly, that he was no longer hard. Sally looked up at him with blood on her lips and a look of broken terror in his eyes and the weight of what he was doing hit him so hard he could almost swear he was the one who had been beaten.

What the hell was he thinking? What the hell was he doing? He had never seen Sally look at anyone like that, and now he had caused that look in her eyes and she would never forgive him. She would always hate him. And he had hurt her, and he didn't even _like_ that stuff. He didn't enjoy beating her up, he hadn't done it for pleasure, he wasn't going to get off on it, not like-

"Sally, what's keeping you?"

 _Speak of the devil._

"The others are all waiting to..." Hooded Justice stepped around the corner and looked down on the scene. Any hope of him mistaking it for an encounter between secret lovers was gone when he took in the blood and Sally's eyes, and he growled, "You vicious little son of a bitch."

Eddie's regret and sorrow were forgotten as panic overtook him. He was frantic to make an excuse, any excuse to save his own skin. "Hey, wait, she wanted me to do it, she- agh!" His head snapped back as HJ punched him in the nose, breaking it upon impact.

He grabbed Eddie by his collar. "You sick little bastard, I'm going to break your neck!" He stared down at the young man, ready to strike again as Eddie caught his breath and regained his wits.

He recalled what he had thought of as he looked down at Sally and regretted hurting her, he recalled how he tried to use her wanting it as an excuse for what he had done to her, and he recalled exactly where he had gotten those ideas from. HJ _did_ get off on doing this, and he got off on doing this with other men, and Eddie looked up at him and said, "This what you like, huh? This is what gets you hot..."

He could see the rage growing in HJ's eyes from behind his hood, and he could see the restraint it took for him to stop him and say, "Get out." It was enough of a satisfaction to know that he was right, that if HJ had continued, he would have been just as bad, and he knew it.

Heaving as he stood, Eddie said, "Oh, sure. Sure, I'm going. But I got your number, see? And one of these days, the joke's gonna be on _you_."

"Get out!" Hooded Justice repeated, and Eddie stumbled out the door, not looking back at Sally even as he heard the other man say, a bit too cruelly to be her savior, "Get up. And for God's sake, cover yourself."

 **A/N: Next chapter is the last chapter with most of the Minutemen, as far as I know. Not sure how many of them I'll weave back in besides Sally and HJ after next time.**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: The aftermath. Eddie sulking and feeling bad, but it's too little and too late. Maybe you shoulda thought about this before you acted, huh, buddy?**

The next morning, Eddie barely awoke in time for work, his head pounding. The previous night, he had drug himself home, barreling into a liquor store on the way and leaving without paying. Now, he was feeling the consequences of that combined with the consequences of being beaten up by Hooded Justice.

Sore was an understatement, but at least the pain kept his mind off what he was trying so hard to avoid thinking about. What he had done to Sally, what he had ruined, what she thought of him now. Whenever he did allow himself to think about it, he felt sick, though he hadn't eaten anything all day. Just the thought of facing her with their matching broken noses and bruises was enough to make him dry heave.

But he would have to face her, and he would have to face everyone, and he had no doubt that they knew by now. They had all been meeting up after for beer, after all, and Sally would have had to explain her face or HJ would have had to explain why she wasn't there. Everyone knew what he had done.

Eddie considered not going to the meeting after work. He considered never facing the Minutemen again, considered disappearing from their lives, even considered going back to Louisville like none of this had ever happened, but it had been a year since he had run away, and if his parents had looked, they'd not cared to look this far.

It was a pathetic thing to admit, given how much most of them didn't like him and how much he didn't like most of them, but the Minutemen was the closest thing he had to a family. They were his only place to go, the only people who knew really knew he existed, who might care if he was gone. And Sally had been the best of them, his first and closest friend, and that was ruined now. He could only hope that Bill would understand and take his side.

~X~

When he arrived at the meeting, he was not surprised to see that Sally was not present. He was also not surprised to see everyone looking at him with looks that ranged from disapproval to downright hatred. It was Nite Owl who looked the most upset, though it was hard to gauge HJ's expression and really know which was more upset.

Larry cleared his throat and said, "Comedian, we've all been talking, and we've reached a unanimous-"

"Nearly unanimous," interrupted the Silhouette.

"We've reached a nearly unanimous decision that you should no longer be a part of the Minutemen," continued Larry, looking annoyed with her addition. "What you did last night is not something we can overlook."

"So...so you're just kicking me out? Just like that?" asked Eddie, looking around at each face, searching for the one who had supported him. Had it been Bill, like he had hoped? Would he speak up now, on his behalf?

"We can't have someone who engages in such...sexually immoral behavior in our group," Captain Metropolis said, sounding so authoritative that it made Eddie sick to his stomach.

"That's rich, comin' from you," he snapped, watching the Captain pale.

"What do you mean by that?"

"You're lucky," said Larry, before Eddie could say anything more, "that I convinced Sally not to press charges. I don't want the incident to reflect negatively on our group. The only way to ensure that stays the case is to make sure that you are not around to do something like that again."

"Listen, ya slimy-" he started, ready to attack the older man before realizing that that would do nothing to improve his case. "I mean, it was a mistake, alright? I didn't...I lost my temper and...I really didn't mean to. Can't ya give me another chance?"

"How do you think Sally would feel, having to work with someone like you every day?" Nite Owl spoke up.

"Well, why doncha ask her?" replied Eddie. "Hell, let me. Let me explain everything, let me try to fix this...let me at least apologize to her."

"No, I think you've done enough. You won't be getting near Sally again, if I have anything to say about it," Larry said.

"But that's..." Again, he felt the urge to lash out, to yell and kick and punch, but he held back. "Please. I promise. I really care about her. Just ask Bill!" He looked to his friend for support.

But Bill shook his head and looked away, as if he and Eddie had never been friends, as if he hadn't listened to the younger man talk on and on about how crazy he was for her. He looked away as if he hated Eddie as much as all the others, and Eddie realized that that must be true. Not only had he lost Sally, but he had lost Bill's friendship, and now he was losing his shitty replacement family.

"Fine," he said. "Ya know what? Fine. Fuck all of ya, and enjoy bein' the picture of perfect purity. Cos none of you guys make mistakes, right?" He gave each and every one of them an accusatory stare, lingering the longest on Captain Metropolis, knowing that he would feel the most guilty. Then he was gone, ignoring some pathetic protest from Nite Owl that his accusations were not fair.

As he slammed the door, he wondered who it was that had voted in his favor.

~X~

He thought about exposing what he knew about the team. Eddie had observed so many secrets over the past year that he could ruin any one of them. He knew that Mothman was starting to show signs of alcoholism, he had some ideas about Nite Owl's true identity, and of course, there was the matter of Silhouette, Hooded Justice, and Captain Metropolis' sexualities. The latter two would be particularly damaging, given the fact there was more to it than just being gay.

He didn't really have anything on Bill, didn't know if there was anything have on Bill, but he was angrier at him than the rest. Bill had, after all, abandoned him, and that wasn't something Eddie could easily forgive. He didn't think he would have to look far to find something to ruin Larry; in fact, just the knowledge that he covered up for his team was enough.

Eddie could expose every single one of them, and ruin the Minutemen, and take it all away from them just as they had taken it from him, but something caused him to hesitate. Sally's image, her entire career, hinged on the success of the Silk Spectre and the Minutemen. Not only that, but she had been linked romantically with HJ in the papers by now, and any scandal involving him would reflect much more negatively on her than a team-wide scandal.

After all the times she'd talked about wanting to make it big and be a star, how could Eddie take that away from her just to feel better about his own mistakes? He had fucked up with her, and badly. Losing his place in the Minutemen was a fair punishment, even if the people judging him had no right to. And he had no way to apologize to her; the least he could do was not risk her career.

So he kept all of the information to himself, and returned to fighting crime solo, paying more attention to the waterfront. It had been hard to keep up when he was off with the others, and things had gotten too relaxed. Within a week, he had changed that, beating every criminal he met within an inch of their lives, taking some just a little bit further; his frustrations had to be worked out somewhere after all.

He had previously slowed down on his pick-pocketing, reserving it only for criminals, but now he resumed doing it indiscriminately. Booze was one of the few ways to help him forget his problems long enough to sleep at night, though he was always careful to not depend on it as much as Mothman had.

Another luxury he used to unwind was smoking. One night, taking out a gang, he had snatched a cigar out of the boss' mouth for show, and nearly coughed up a lung trying to smoke it. They had laughed at him until he had seriously injured every last one of them, and he had taken up smoking to get it right, finding that he rather liked it.

These things weren't that bad, he thought. These were fine ways to cope. But he had done something, the night after being thrown out of the Minutemen, that he did not think was a good way to cope, that he knew he was going to regret, that he knew he was going to do again anyway.

He knew where the prostitutes did their business, and he had picked a rather full pocket that day, and he knew exactly what he was looking for. He found her there, and he was young enough and drunk enough to think she was beautiful, with her red hair that was almost the right color and her heavy makeup that did nothing to hide how gaunt her face was. She said her name, but he told her he didn't want to know it and he wasn't going to call her that.

He took her to an isolated alley and he fucked her, and if she noticed the name that was on his lips that night, she didn't say anything. And he paid her with no fuss and she went back to ensnare her next victim and he went home to try and forget that he had just lost his virginity to a hooker that he had pretended was Sally.

Later, he would laugh about it. He would laugh at how stupid he had been, at how that hadn't fixed a damn thing, and at how he had still enjoyed it, because wasn't that just the way it always was? After all, if you couldn't someday find your own mistakes and misfortunes funny, could you really say you'd moved on?

 **A/N: I'm hoping to reveal who voted in his favor later, but you guys might not like it. I have my reasons, of course, but god knows I'll have someone barking at me over it.**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: This chapter is the time when Eddie gets his new costume. Obviously, that means there's going to be some violence here, so yeah.**

The year after Eddie's dismissal from the Minutemen passed, and as it did, he found himself caring less and less. It had been a joke, really; him, thinking he actually fit in with them, that he fit in with anyone. It would have been a bit more funny if he hadn't been the punchline, but that was okay. He was learning to appreciate good humor even when it was at his expense.

As for what he thought about everything with Sally...he didn't. He didn't want to turn what they had had into a joke- that would be a disrespect to her that he could not bear, and it would also turn whatever he had felt for her into a joke as well. If everything in the world was a joke, his feelings for Sally Jupiter had to be the one exception to that rule.

And so, unable to use his typical coping mechanism with that, he decided it was better to just forget about it entirely. He was seventeen now, and he was not a bad looking young man. If he wanted, he could have a lot of women, and sometimes he did, though there were no relationships. There was no point in allowing himself to fall for that one again; that was a punchline he knew too well and didn't want to repeat.

So that was his life for the next year. Tolerating his factory job by day so that he could beat up criminals by night, stealing what he wanted and buying what he wanted, wasting his money on booze and cigars and occasionally women, whenever one struck his interest. He tried to stray from redheads, but that took time.

Even without the Minutemen, he was still the Comedian, and he still doled out his own brand of justice every night. The papers questioned his disappearance from the group, but no answers came and no scandal theories took off, so it was soon nearly forgotten that he was ever a part of them.

Sally remained popular, but she still only worked as the Silk Spectre; from what Eddie could tell, no acting or modeling jobs came to her anymore. Not that he was looking for her or anything. Not that he still kept any articles she appeared in. He had forgotten all about her, after all.

~X~

Eddie lived only for the nights when he could change out of his work uniform and into his costume, become someone else, someone better and stronger, and do whatever he wanted. There was no one to stop him from being as brutal as he pleased, after all, and it became more common that criminals who faced off against him ended up six feet under. He was a fearsome sight to behold, and the bright yellow costume that had once been laughed at now caused nothing but terror.

Until he would come across some idiot who didn't pay attention to the papers, who barely remembered the names of the vigilantes of New York, much less what they looked like. Then Eddie would have to use his bat to educate them a little bit. He hated cases like that, because he hated not being recognized, but beggars can't be choosers, and he'd take what fights he could get.

One night, he came across just that sort of fight, though it was nowhere near the grandiose sort he was used to. The man was alone, seemed to have no gang affiliations, and was strung out on something, barely able to walk. He was too easy of a target, bordering on being boring, but he could cause trouble for someone else and it had been a slow night.

Eddie cornered him, ready to fight, expecting this to be over in no time. He didn't expect the man to suddenly strike. He didn't expect the man to react so quickly, so erratically, that he got the jump on him. He didn't expect the man to have a knife.

But before he knew what had hit him, a knife had been plunged into his chest and the man was running away in a panic, and he couldn't feel anything but he knew it was supposed to hurt. He was bleeding, a dark red staining through the yellow of his costume, and he was dizzy, and there was no one around, and he was going to die in a back alley, stabbed by some dumbass who didn't even know who he was. He hadn't ever gotten to apologize or...

His vision blurred as he stood, shaking, stumbling, trying to find his way to somewhere that wasn't here. Where was a hero now, to rescue him as he hurt and bled and struggled? Where was Nite Owl? Where was Dollar Bill? Where was Silk Spectre? He was going to die and they didn't even know it. Too busy fighting the glamorous villains to worry about victims stabbed by street thugs.

His chest throbbed around the knife and he wondered if he was supposed to pull it out on his own or not. Before he could decide, his hand was already on it, yanking it out as a searing pain replaced the dull, deep throb that had settled in. Blood pour down the front of his jumpsuit and he knew that it would not come out.

He laughed, then, because he was dying, so when the fuck would he have time to worry about removing a stain? Laughing made it hurt even worse and his vision darkened around the edges as he steadied himself against a wall. It was then that he looked up and saw something in the dull glow of a streetlamp, a silhouette of a woman.

"Sally?" he coughed, but he knew it wasn't; wrong build, and her hair would have shown even in the dim lighting. Whoever it was started walking towards him just as he blacked out.

~X~

The first thing Eddie felt after that was another aching throb in his chest, and he opened his eyes, blinking from the bright lights and white walls. He was in a bed that wasn't his, in a room that wasn't his, and he lightly touched the sore spot in his chest to find that it was no longer damp with blood.

As his focus slowly returned to him, he realized that he was in a hospital. The events of the night before were still so fresh in his mind, despite being so surreal and dreamlike as they happened. He remembered being stabbed, and trying to find his way here, and cursing his former teammates for not being there to save him, and seeing the woman that wasn't Sally. She must have brought him here.

As he was thinking about this, a doctor stepped into his room. "Glad to see you're awake," he said. "Hell of a night, huh?"

"You could say that," Eddie replied with a chuckle. His wound throbbed sharply and he winced. It looked like he would have to lay off the joking for a while, if that was even possible.

The doctor pulled something purple out of his pocket- Eddie's mask. "I get a lot of your kind in here," he said. "You don't have to worry about me exposing you or anything. But I'm going to have to recommend you stay off the streets until you're healed up. You're lucky that man didn't kill you. He just barely missed your vitals."

"But I'm alright, right?"

"Like I said, you'll need to take it easy for a while, but, yes, you're going to be just fine. Lucky that woman found you, too."

"Is she still around?" he asked. "I mean, do you have any idea who she is?"

"I never saw her myself," the doctor replied. "From what I heard, she just dropped you off and disappeared."

Eddie sighed. He hated not being in the loop for anything, but especially for something that directly concerned him. It would bother him, not knowing who saved him. But there were more important things to worry about, such as finding who had landed him in the hospital in the first place.

~X~

Eddie did his best to follow the doctor's instructions, but, after a week, the ache in his chest had dulled enough for him to ignore it, and his impatience got the better of him. Knowing that there was someone out there who had nearly killed him and gotten away with him drove him absolutely crazy.

As he had predicted, the blood had stained his outfit beyond repair, but that was just as well. The fabric was too thin to really protect him and he was only fooling himself if he thought his luck would hold out forever. It had already failed him once; who knew when the next time someone came after him with a knife would be?

So he got a new costume- a leather vest, with leather pants and gloves, all black. His boots and mask were black now, too, and he added thick knee pads and shin guards. The look was grim, not at all suiting the Comedian, but he couldn't afford to risk his life for the sake of a whimsical costume. He did need something to identify himself by, and so he decided to keep the belt for the time being.

With his new costume ready, he took to the streets, searching specifically for the man who had stabbed him. For a week, he ignored all other crime, concerned only with his personal vengeance. Just as he was starting to wonder if this man was even still on the streets or if he had met his own end somehow, he found him.

One final addition Eddie had made to his costume rested in the holster on his thigh, ready to enact his revenge. Another thing he could no longer be realistic about was his own lack of weapons. A baseball bat offered no protection, and his fists offered even less. He never cared about the morality issue of heroes carrying guns, and so now, nothing stopped him from carrying his own.

He approached the man silently, tapping him on the shoulder. When the man turned, Eddie punched him in the face, sending him flying back. He pulled out his pistol then, aiming and pulling the trigger. It was the first time he had used it, and the recoil surprised him. The bullet bounced off the brick wall, missing the man.

"Fuck!" Eddie snarled, and then the man was running. He aimed again and he missed again, and found that a moving target was much harder to hit than a still one- and he hadn't been the best at hitting that still target. He charged after his former assailant, then, and grabbed him by the back of his head, slamming it against the wall.

He slammed him again and again, face first. Blood poured down the man's face and his breathing was so shallow that it was hardly noticeable. Eddie threw him to the ground and aimed again. This time, he did not miss.

 **A/N: Since the smiley face on his trademark button was not popularized until the 60s, it stands to reason he wouldn't have it straight away. However, I didn't think he'd be without something related to his name, so I had him keep the jester belt for now.**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: This is a pretty short chapter, considering it is the entirety of his time in World War II. Sorry, but war stories are not my forte, and I feel like if anything really significant happened in that war, we would have been told in canon. So I kept it basic and just used it to establish him as an American hero.**

As time had gone on, the political situation in Europe had only gotten worse. Eddie noticed this, of course, but he didn't really care one way or the other. Perhaps if he were in the middle of it- and, oh, how he would love to be in the middle of a brawl that size- he might, but as long as the US stayed out of it, he didn't consider it any of his damn concern.

And then the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, and things changed. Everyone knew that this meant the US was stepping into the conflict, and though it was a subject of fear and dread for most, it filled Eddie with only excitement. He was young and he was healthy and he was strong. He wasn't the best with a gun but that could be improved on with proper training.

Best of all, he was eighteen now, which meant that there was nothing stopping him from enlisting. Not only that, but he had special plans for his enlistment, plans to ensure that he was more than just canon fodder. He had plans that would ensure that he was the star of the goddamn show, and more of a hero than anybody else who ever tried to don a mask.

Eddie was going places. He had always thought that he was; that had been the point of running away. Getting stuck in a dead end factory job had put a temporary wrench in those places, but he had his way out now. He had always thought of the Comedian as being an escape, a way to let himself out in a way that didn't cost him his job, but he hadn't realized that the identity had crafted itself an image, that becoming a hero like he had meant something more.

Everyone knew about the costumed adventurer craze that was more prevalent in New York than anywhere else and everyone knew about the Comedian. Perhaps Eddie Blake had not made it anywhere yet, but now he was going places and the Comedian was taking him there. All there was to do was make the military an offer.

So he did. Rather than arriving as himself when he enlisted, he arrived as the Comedian, and they loved it. Of course they did; who wouldn't want somebody like him fighting on their side? While the other vigilantes had done everything in their power to avoid mentioning the war, he had stepped out and said exactly what he thought.

Though the government knew who he truly was, Eddie went overseas as the Comedian, as a symbol of heroism and patriotism in the United States. To have a costumed adventurer fighting would surely boost the nation's morale; the propaganda alone would be phenomenal. Who wouldn't want to enlist when they knew that he had done so? It was the perfect plan and it went off without a hitch.

First things first, he was sent through basic training, though he received better treatment than the other recruits. They may have resented him for it, but he couldn't say that he cared. He had had it rough before himself and they would survive. His costume was mostly appreciated, but his belt was taken away as they claimed it wasn't practical enough.

He didn't think that the red, white, and blue shoulder pads he was given for publicity photos were very practical either, but he was told that, when actually on the battlefield, they would be replaced with camouflage. He didn't feel much like a comedian in this outfit, but if that was what he had to do, it was a small price to pay.

After basic, he went on to more advanced training. He had become an excellent shot by this point, but during this stage of training, he was introduced to every sort of weapon the army had to offer and was made an expert with them all. He was taught spying techniques and leadership qualities, and everything in between that he might need to know.

But when they sent him into the Pacific, he was given instructions that he didn't exactly agree with: look tough, smile for the camera, and hold back during actual combat. The men in charge wanted him to stay safe, claiming they couldn't lose him so early on, not when they still needed to use his image so much. He was only going to be used as an accessory to make them look better, and he was supposed to grin and bear it.

Eddie didn't do things that way. They had trained him to be so much more than a poster boy, and if they thought he wasn't going to use that to his advantage, then they were dead wrong. He had his own plans, after all, and those plans involved getting to beat the ever loving shit out of some Japanese soldiers.

"Stay back," he was always told. "Pick off the stragglers. Make sure to stay smiling in case you need to pose."

But he got tired of staying back, and one day, he didn't. Shoving his fellow soldiers out of the way, he charged forward into the heat of the battle, and all they could do was try to cover him as he barreled through the enemy forces, taking them down left and right, faster and stronger than anyone around. He still made sure to keep on smiling, though, and some very nice photos were taken that day.

~X~

"What the hell was that about?" his commanding officer asked him, when the battle was won and the wounded were being tended to.

"Got bored," Eddie replied.

"You were given clear instructions to stay out of it. The plans I made for my men were compromised because of your insubordination. I could have you-"

"But ya couldn't," he said, chuckling. "Government wants me out here. Ya try to get rid of me, I'll just go somewhere else and then do the same damn thing. I don't wanna follow bullshit instructions no more, got it? Everyone out here treats me like some joke, and that don't sit well with me."

"Son, you _are_ a joke. My men are the real heroes of this war, and you're just a government sponsored symbol. If you were a real man, you wouldn't get to eat better than my men and you wouldn't get to sleep more comfortably than my men, and you wouldn't be the star of every news reel back home. You're nothing _but_ a joke."

"Well, see, that's where you're wrong, jackass. I got more training then any of your men, maybe even more training than you. I get treated better cos I am better, and pretty soon, you're all gonna know it. Won't be long before I'm runnin' the show here, so ya better watch how ya talk to me, cos I'll remember it." He smirked. "I don't know how many times I gotta remind people. I'm not a joke, I'm the goddamn Comedian."

~X~

From that point on, he made his own rules and his own plans, and though he never gained rank, it was clear who was really in charge. The years went on and the war went on, and Eddie was the best soldier in the Pacific. There was not a battle he faced that was not won.

However, he was still one man and it was such a large war. Eventually, he got news of victory in Europe, but Japan was still proving to be a rather difficult foe. That was when the United States revealed their new plan, a plan to devastate Japan so much that they would have to surrender, that they would be too afraid to resist any longer.

Eddie didn't know the details, but he wondered how anyone could be so sure of that. If they had that sort of power, why had they not used it already? But then the news came that changed everything, the news that President Truman had ordered an atomic bomb to be dropped on the city of Hiroshima.

Days later, the same thing was done to Nagasaki, and before they could bomb any other cities, Japan had surrendered. Nuclear weapons were something that had previously been unheard of in most places, and now they had been the key to victory. They scared the hell out of Eddie, but that was not something he planned to admit to anyone, nor was it a fear he would let get to him as long as the nukes were on his side.

Soon after, he was returned to the US with the reputation as the most resilient hero in the Pacific theatre and a key piece in winning the war. Of course, he knew it wouldn't have happened without the bombings, but he was more than happy to take credit.

~X~

"So, what you're sayin' is, I just gotta keep doin' what I was doin' before the war, an' you guys are gonna pay me?" he asked the man across from him, a government agent he had been sent to meet with after his return.

"In a manner of speaking," the man replied. "You're going to be a special sort of agent. You're going to continue to operate at the Comedian, and you're going to continue wearing the patriotic shoulder pads that were added to your costume. You're going to be in the papers every week because you're a war hero and you're the ideal American patriot.

"But, in addition to that, you're going to be working for us. Now, like I said, you won't have to move or change much. You'll just be working on cases for us and receiving information in addition to whatever you decide to handle on your own. You'll receive some rather handsome checks for that, and everyone's happy. So, what do you say?"

Eddie could see it now, all of his plans since leaving Louisville coming together. He had never imagined things playing out quite like this, but it was better and, either way, he was somebody very important now. Gone were the days of working in a factory and gone were the days of answering to the other Minutemen.

"So, where do I sign?"


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Shit, two updates in one day? I've fallen a little ahead of schedule so I've been kicking it into high gear to get this back to speed. In this chapter, we find out who defended Eddie back in the Minutemen.**

1946 came and went by, and Eddie kept his work up. He had moved out of his apartment on the Hudson when he went overseas, and with his new government paychecks, he could afford to live in a much better part of town.

Now in his early twenties and living much better than he had before, Eddie no longer bothered with pickpocketing. It didn't hold the same thrill as before and he could afford to do pretty much anything he wanted. He was not rich, but he did well enough to live comfortably.

During the times when he did not have a government sponsored job keeping him busy, he occasionally took to patrolling the streets as before, but he did not put nearly as much focus into it as before. He would stop any crime he came across, but he was not thorough in his searches and some nights he would not bother going out at all.

Before he knew it, it was late September, and he had been back in the US for over a year. That was when he opened the newspaper and saw the Minutemen mentioned, something that had been happening less and less frequently (while he was being mentioned more and more frequently).

Even more interesting than that, the article focused on the Silhouette. It seemed that her identity had finally been discovered by somebody, and that somebody had, while following her around, discovered her sexuality. He couldn't help laughing to himself as he read all about how the Silhouette was really a woman named Ursula Zandt, and that she lived with another woman, that she was a lesbian.

Of course, he had known that for years, and he was sure that some of the Minutemen must have caught on at some point. But he had never thought the public would catch wind of it before HJ and Metropolis were exposed, seeing as they were much more obvious about it. Now her secret was out, though, and he wondered how the group was going to react to this assault on their precious little image.

He found he did not care as much about it as he used to.

~X~

A few days later, he decided to go on patrol. He hadn't been very busy lately, and he was starting to get bored. Maybe he would try a little harder; taking out a few criminals felt like just the thing he needed. If he kept inside for too long, his old temper might resurface, and it had been under his control for so long.

However, it seemed that the one night he had chosen to put his full effort into things was turning out to be a dull one. No matter where he looked, he found nothing, not even a simple mugging. It was so boring that he was ready to call it quits and go home when someone spoke to him.

"It's been a long time, Comedian," said the low, feminine voice. The Silhouette stepped forward, smiling demurely.

"Sure as fuck has," he said. "Last time I recall seein' ya is when you assholes threw me out of the Minutemen." He snarled at her, wondering if she was there to fight him for some reason. She was strong and would be a fun challenge.

"I wouldn't be so quick to assume _I_ threw you out," she said. "And I am no longer a member of the Minutemen myself. We have something in common."

Eddie blinked at her, confused by both statements. "Wait, what the hell do you mean? About both things I mean?"

"Well, as for the second statement, it's simple," she replied. "Our good heroes decided that they couldn't have a degenerate homosexual tainting their precious image." She gave a short laugh and he snorted. "Can you believe the hypocrisy of that? They unanimously voted to throw me out!"

"You mean those two fags didn't wanna stand up for one of their own?" he asked. If she was offended by his use of that word, she didn't show it.

She shook her head. "Of course not. They're afraid it'll be them next, so they pretend they're not just as bad as I am. That whole group is just a bunch of liars and hypocrites. It's all an act but...I suppose that's why we're wearing costumes."

"Good one," he said. "But...what did you mean about the first thing?"

She smirked. "I was the one person who voted for you to stay."

"Wha... _you_?" he asked, stunned. "But...but _why_? I figured you of all people wouldn't take my side on something like that."

"What, because I'm a woman too?" she asked. "Perhaps I didn't agree with what you did, but I disliked Sally Jupiter even more. The way she strutted around like she was better than me just because she wore a short skirt. Everything she did was for attention and she didn't care about the people she saved."

"Watch it," he said in a warning tone. Not only did he not like hearing Ursula talk about her like that, but he had done his best to avoid thinking about her for a while, and that only brought up memories he didn't want to face.

"Right, sorry," she said, not sounding very sorry. "Anyway, I didn't think you were entirely at fault, given the way she treated you. I realize now that that was petty but...I still don't like her, so I don't regret it that much, especially given the fact that she voted against me too. But I suppose now I'm glad I can say I defended someone in that sort of situation, because it gives me the right to be mad I was not defended."

"Our situations are nothin' alike," he replied.

"No, perhaps they aren't, from a moral standpoint. But morality doesn't seem to be something the Minutemen are really all that concerned about, now is it?" Before he could respond, she said, "I must be on my way now. Maybe we'll be seeing a little more of each other now."

"Yeah, maybe," said Eddie as he watched her walk away.

~X~

Six weeks later, he saw in the papers that she had been murdered in her sleep by a nobody villain. They hadn't met up even once after their encounter, and he found himself regretting that. Maybe they could have been friends, as unlikely as a partnership as that would have been. He hadn't had any real friends in years, but the chance to form a bond with Ursula was gone now.

There was no service publicly announced, but even if there had been, he couldn't have gone. A job came through that required his full attention, and, even if he hadn't been busy, he would not have wanted to go and see some of his former teammates there, pretending to be sad about the woman they had thrown out to her death. If there was even a funeral at all, which, again, he didn't know.

But, in 1947, there was a funeral for Dollar Bill, who had gotten stuck while attempting to stop a bank robbery. The revolving door and his cape had not been a very good combination, and the robbers had taken the opportunity to shoot him to death. Eddie did not even consider going to the funeral; not only would they all be there, but he did not mourn the man being buried.

He had never forgotten how betrayed he had felt when Bill had not said a word to defend him, had not even tried to talk to him after the incident or given him a chance to explain himself. His only friend in the world besides Sally had abandoned him, and now he couldn't bring himself to give a damn about the man's passing.

In fact, when he read the bit about his cape, he couldn't help but laugh aloud.

~X~

The papers seemed to be full of the Minutemen- or, rather, of the Minutemen's slow decline. With Eddie gone and two of its members dead, it was already on its last legs when it was announced that the Silk Spectre was retiring to focus on her upcoming acting career. The nation couldn't believe that Sally Jupiter would no longer be fighting crime on the streets of New York, and Eddie hated the pang he felt in his stomach when he realized that he could no longer follow her adventures.

Because, of course, that meant admitting to himself that he had been following her adventures in the first place. It was true that he had tried to forget about her after the war, and that he had even been somewhat successful a few times, but any time he saw her in the news, he couldn't help but dwell on it. Even after all these years, he still had it so bad for her that even he couldn't find it funny.

But he told himself he didn't have time to think about things like that. The news was not just filled with the Minutemen; it was also filled with the Comedian. The government had kept him in good work and, in return, he had let them use him for whatever propaganda they wanted. He had become nearly synonymous with patriotism, and every child was taught to want to be just like him when they grew up.

Of course, they didn't know the truth. They didn't know the way he laughed as he gunned down thugs or the way he delighted at every death he caused in the war. They didn't know that he would not always verify the innocence of a criminal before killing them in 'self-defense' or that he had gotten as far as he had through insubordination and shameless brutality. They didn't know that he didn't give a damn about America or its dreams or anything else but himself.

It was one of the greatest jokes he had ever heard, but he couldn't tell anyone, because then they would realize that this time, they were the punchline, and nobody liked finding out that they were the punchline. For now, the joke was on them and Eddie was the only one who knew. He had never minded laughing alone.

 **A/N: Sorry if you guys don't like what Ursula did but I figured I'd portray her just a little bit negatively. We're always shown her as some sort of saint, both in fanfiction and Before Watchmen, yet we're given no evidence to support that. All we know is she and Sally didn't get along and she goads Sally about her heritage. So I figured, hey, let's make her a little more complex, let's see her side with Eddie just to do something against Sally.**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: In this chapter, Eddie finds out about Sally getting married and reacts exactly how one would expect: violence. Not against her, thankfully, but he does really kick some poor someone's ass this chapter. And then there's...fluff? In a story about Eddie? Fuck, I am ruining this.**

Not long after Sally retired, she made it into the papers again, but it wasn't due to a movie contract or a modeling job or anything that Eddie would have expected from the next time he saw her in the papers. No, she made it into the news because she had gotten married.

To Larry.

Of all fucking people, Sally had married Larry. Of all the men in the world, of all the men that she and Eddie mutually knew, and she had chosen to marry Laurence Schexnayder. As if finding out that she was married wasn't bad enough, there was the knowledge that _he_ had won. Jealous, slimy, conniving Larry had won Sally and Eddie had never even had the chance to try and fix things.

He should have gone to see her sooner. He knew damn well that he should have gone to see her instead of waiting around for all these years and pretending that he didn't care about her anymore and trying not to think about her. If he had just _tried_ they probably wouldn't be in this situation at all! She probably wasn't even mad at him anymore, especially not now that he was a war hero. She probably would have fallen all over him if he'd gone to visit after he had returned.

But now here he was, finding out that Larry- of all goddamn people- had made his move and Sally had fucking fallen for it. What the hell could she even see in a guy like? If that was her type, did Eddie ever stand a chance in the first place? The amount of questions and the lack of answers made him angry, and he didn't have any work, and he needed something to take it out on, soon.

So, even though it was still early afternoon, he put on his costume and took to the streets, hoping that he wouldn't be stopped by some bunch of kids looking for autographs. He really didn't know if his patience would hold out for something like that, or for anything, really.

But it seemed that at least something was going his way that day, for it did not take long for him to discover a bank robbery in progress with none of the few remaining Minutemen in sight, and he hadn't been stopped by a single eager fan on the way. It was just him and the robber- and a few police officers, but they stepped aside when they saw the Comedian.

The robber was, of course, holding the tellers hostage and giving out ridiculous demands and much too distracted to notice Eddie, with all his government-sponsored stealth training- sneaking up on him. He never even noticed the masked man until it was much too late and Eddie was upon him, tackling him to the ground and disarming him.

And that should have been all there was to it, but he was in a bad mood and he wanted to make this man suffer because he could not hurt the man that he really wanted to. The cops were outside and wouldn't have to know the truth; the tellers were hiding behind the counter, too scared to look and too scared to talk about it even if they did.

Eddie punched himself in the jaw, wincing at the power in his own hit. He let out an exaggerated cry of pain before saying, "You bastard, did you just fuckin' punch me? You're gonna pay for that one!" The robber looked appropriately confused as Eddie threw another punch to his own face, this time splitting his lip.

"Fuck!" he snarled. "That's it, don't say I didn't warn ya!" Then he finally turned his fists to the bank robber, pounding into the man's face without mercy until his nose was broken and he had lost quite a few teeth. His attention then shifted to the man's stomach, until the man was dry heaving, and to finish out the job, he took the man's right arm and snapped it without much effort.

"Good luck holdin' a gun now, huh, buddy?" he said with a laugh. He stood up and kicked the man one last time for good measure before staggering outside, pretending to be much more hurt than he was.

"He's all yours!" he said to the cops and headed back home, feeling better, but only slightly.

~X~

It was not enough to satisfy him, and neither was taking out an entire gang later that night. Nothing could take his mind off of Sally and he felt that the only thing that would help was getting answers somehow. He just had to know what she had been thinking, what had happened to make her marry him. And if he had the chance to punch Larry in the face, so much the better for himself.

So he decided that he would have to pay the happy couple a visit. Larry couldn't make him leave this time, couldn't intimidate him into leaving Sally alone anymore. Eddie was a man now and he was somebody; he was a government agent and he was an American hero. Larry was nothing.

It didn't take much work to find out their address and he made the trip to their house, a brownstone in the Upper East Side. There were no cars outside when he arrived, however, and he let out a disappointed sigh. He had been so prepared for the confrontation that he had not even entertained the possibility of the couple not being home.

He could feel himself deflating and he shook his head. No point in heading home now, after he had put the effort into coming out here. Even knowing that there would likely be no answer, he decided to knock on the door, and then wait outside until somebody came back.

But after only two harsh knocks, the door opened and there stood Sally Jupiter, seven years older but not a bit less beautiful than he remembered, and for a moment, he was sixteen again and he almost blushed.

"Hi, Sal," he said, grinning at her.

"Eddie?" she asked, her eyes widening. "What are you..."

"Thought I'd stop by and say hello," he replied before she finished her question. "Where's the mister?"

Her eyes flashed and she snarled, "He isn't here. And you shouldn't be."

"Huh?" He blinked. "Sally, is something wrong?"

"Are you- did you honestly- you're not seriously-!" she sputtered, raising her voice more with each word. Suddenly she stopped, looking around self-consciously, though there was no one else on the street. Still, she seemed afraid of being overheard and muttered, "Come inside."

He was pleased that she was inviting him in, but this was overshadowed by his confusion at her apparent anger and a nearly unfamiliar- at this point- sadness at the fear he saw in her eyes. Could it be that, after all this time, she was still upset? There was no way, it had been too long and it had only been one time, and she must have understood that he hadn't meant it, right?

But she looked so angry to see him and she looked afraid, and that image didn't fit what he had expected. Eddie stepped into her home, and as soon as the door had closed behind them, she turned on him, her rage barely eclipsing her fear.

"You have a lot of nerve, coming around here!" she said, keeping her distance as she glared at him. "I mean, honestly! As if it weren't enough what you did to me, you have to come back and taunt me after I'm married?"

"Sal...are you really still mad about all that?"

"Am I really still _mad_?!" she shouted, looking as if she didn't quite believe what she was hearing. "Of course I'm still mad, Eddie! What you did to me was...was...what the fuck is wrong with you, that I have to sit here and _explain_ this?!"

"I just thought you'd be over it by now, is all," he muttered, and again, he felt sixteen again, like she was the adult and he was the child, and he was being scolded even though he really didn't know why.

"Are you _joking_?" she asked.

"Baby, if I was joking, you'd know," he replied with a smirk, and she groaned, throwing up her hands in frustration.

"I give up on you," Sally said. "I do. I'm _not_ over it, and the fact that you don't even understand _why_ -"

"I'm sorry," he interrupted, smirk fading. "Alright? I mean...look, I did some shitty things and I know that, and I'm sorry. I guess it was stupid to think that you wouldn't be mad, but it's been seven years and I thought...fuck." He laughed nervously. "Ya know, I'm really terrible at this, right?"

She didn't answer, but she also wasn't yelling at him anymore, and that was a start. "Back then, I was crazy about ya. I don't know if you just how much it meant to me, but it meant a lot. I didn't really have any other friends, and I dunno...I wanted ya like crazy and I thought you felt the same so when you didn't, I just lost it. Ya know? It was wrong and it was awful and ya didn't deserve that and I can't take it back but...I'm sorry."

"You're apologizing?" she said at last. Her face had softened quite a bit.

"Yeah, I'm apologizin'. I never wanted things to get out of hand like that, and I wanted to apologize back then, but they wouldn't let me. Again, it's stupid of me, but I thought ya might have gotten over it since then, but I'm apologizin' now. I'm sorry, Sally, and I really mean that." He was never one to apologize or admit that he was wrong, but he had spent years regretting this and then avoiding this, and now he had the chance to at least gain her forgiveness. And if that was all he got, he swore it would be enough.

"Eddie...oh, Eddie, you always have been so stupid," she said, but she was laughing and closing the distance between them. She laid a hand on his arm, just like she always used to and his heart leaped, just like it always used to. "But I've never heard you sound so goddamn sincere and...I forgive you. I realize I may have...made you think there was more between us than there was, back then."

"Yeah, well, that's in the past," he said, not eager to discuss what might not have been. He preferred to believe that there had at least been a little something between them. "I really wanna know more about the present!" They went to sit on her couch as he asked, "So, Larry made an honest woman out of ya?"

"Me? An honest woman?" Sally snickered. "Never!" They had a good laugh at that, but when her laughter trailed off, there was a new sadness in her eyes. "No, it's not really...I mean, our marriage is...I'm not sure how to explain it, really."

"Are things...bad or somethin'?" Eddie didn't even need to ask; the answer was written all over face.

She shrugged. "I don't...how can someone really judge the status of a marriage that's just for convenience? I married him because he said if I did, I didn't have to keep fighting crime while I waited to get more work. He would deal with other work and hold down the house until I could land a movie. He's always gone on business, which is why he's not here now..."

"So he doesn't pay attention to ya."

"No, but...like I said, we didn't marry for love," she replied. "I have no reason to expect anything more from him."

"That's bullshit, Sal. You should expect the world from him and he should give it to ya. How could he marry a girl like you and not realize what a catch you are? You deserve a hell of a lot more than this."

"Oh, Eddie, cut that flattery out," she said with a giggle, but it was hollow. After a pause, she said, "Who knows what I really deserve? Lately, I feel like this is all I'm getting. I sometimes think I'm getting too old, and maybe that's why I'm not getting acting jobs and why my own husband won't touch me." She said the last part bitterly and did not seem to care about the personal nature of the statement.

"I don't see why he wouldn't. I don't see why he does any of the shit he does. He got the most beautiful gal in the whole world here, and he just takes it for granted." Eddie knew he was saying too much, that he was being a bit too friendly, but he couldn't help it. He couldn't stand seeing Sally so sad over a creep like Larry. "If I were him...well, I wouldn't treat ya like that, I guarantee it. And if I was a director, I'd let ya star in all my movies! You're beautiful, Sally. Don't let anybody tell ya otherwise."

She looked up at him, her eyes shining with tears. "Eddie...do you really..."

"I mean every word," he replied sincerely. "These past seven years, it's been real hard for me to forget-"

But then her lips were on his and he didn't get the chance to say anything more. Sally kissed him long and hard, not breaking it even as she climbed on top of him. She straddled him on the couch while they lost themselves in the kiss, and then he was sixteen again, realizing that this was his big chance, that Sally wanted him to make his move.

And this time, he wasn't wrong.

 **A/N: Sorry, guys, but we're entering one of my favorite story arcs: the affair! I know it's been a week since I updated and things have slowed down, but I'm hoping they can pick back up again.**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: If Eddie looks too sympathetic in this chapter, I'm sorry. I'm trying my best not to make him awful, but Sally describes him as being gentle with her when they actually do it, so...I don't know, I feel like he actually cared about her, so yeah. Sorry.**

Sally dozed off not long after they had finished, and Eddie let her lay on the couch and nap. He was tired himself, but he sat on the floor beside her while she slept. It didn't matter how tired he felt; he was so damn happy that he was fine with just sitting and watching over her. Not to mention the fact that she looked beautiful and peaceful and that was enough to keep him content for the time being.

He had been with his fair share of women over the years, many of them ones that reminded him of Sally in some way, but nothing could compare to the real thing. It had been like nothing he could describe; tender, in a way he hadn't thought he could be, romantic in a way that he had thought impossible.

He was not a tender man and romance did not exist, but there, with Sally, all of that had changed. Now everything had changed; he had her back, not only as his friend but as the lover he had always wanted and it made him wonder just how different things would be now. It wasn't all that clear just how much he had changed over the years; on the outside, he was nearly the same.

But he was a crueler man than he once was, and he had come to care so much less about the world around him. His sense of humor had darkened upon realizing that the world was a joke that only he was in on and he had never expected to be anything but alone. If there was anyone who could change that, it would be Sally.

Even with nothing else to care about, he had still cared about her more than he ever admitted, and with somebody to care for now, he did not know how long his facade as the Comedian would hold up. She could never be a joke to him, never had been, and that had been easy to ignore without her around. If they were together now, he would have to acknowledge that she wasn't a part of the joke, that perhaps the world was not exactly as he said it was.

But for now he ignored the complications of that and watched her rest, lost himself in her deep, steady breathing. She would always be beautiful to him; for all he knew, she had aged considerably and he wasn't able to notice it.

After a while, she began to stir, opening her eyes and jumping slightly when she noticed Eddie. "Rest alright?" he asked.

"Oh, god," she said. "Oh, god, I really...we really...oh, god, you need to leave." She stood up in a panic and began dressing, not looking at him.

"Sal, what's wrong?" He was confused by her behavior.

"What do you think is wrong?" she snapped. "I can't believe I just _did_ that. I mean, I'm _married_ and I _slept with you_. And, as if that weren't bad enough, you're... _you_."

He cringed at that last remark; it stung quite a bit, as did the rest of what she was saying. "You're not saying that you...regret that, are ya?"

"I..." She paused, her panic fading into a sad confusion. "I don't know, and I guess that's the worst part of it. I know we shouldn't have done that, not with the way things are, but...I'm just so lonely, you understand that. And you're here and I've always thought you were attractive but..."

"But what? I don't really see the problem, truth be told."

Sally sighed. "I know you don't, but...oh, I just don't know. I don't really regret it, but I still think I should at least feel guilty. I mean, if Larry..."

"Forget about Larry," said Eddie. "First of all, he ain't here. Second of all, the whole reason this happened is because of the terrible way he treats you. If what we did was wrong, then it's only cos he did wrong first. Besides I..." He glanced off to the side. "I don't want ya to feel guilty about all of that."

She looked reluctant, but said, "Okay...okay, I don't. It was great, don't think I didn't enjoy it. And I had always wondered what it would be like to see you again, after all these years..."

"I've wanted to see you again for a long time," he said. "Sal, after all these years, ya know, some stuff hasn't changed and..." He trailed off, feeling his nerve slipping. He wanted to tell her about his feelings, let her know exactly what it was he had always wanted out of her, but when he had the proper chance, he found that he couldn't. All he could say was, "Well, I just wanna see ya again, I guess."

"Maybe...maybe we can do this more often," she said, her reluctance slipping away. "Larry's away a lot, after all, and I do get so _lonely_ out here by myself. Do you think you can make some time for me again?"

"For you, baby? Anything."

~X~

And that was how the arrangement began; she'd call him when Larry was out of town, he'd come over, they'd have sex, and then they'd catch up a little more. He talked about the war and how he'd earned his fame and the time he got stabbed- which she nearly had a heart attack upon hearing. She would tell him about her remaining time in the Minutemen and how downhill it had gone and how there was supposed to be a movie about her in the works, but they were having some complications.

He was not allowed to smoke in her house because she said the scent of his cigar smoke would be too hard to get out and a dead giveaway. Plus, she didn't like smoking in person; it looked plenty nice in pictures but the smoke choked her up. He had to come in through the back door and he had to be stealthy so that the neighbors didn't know he came over so often.

He was always tempted to ask her where this relationship was going. When was she going to leave Larry? When were they going to tell people about them? Was he supposed to plan to marry her? He wondered how she would feel about his government work, and if she would be interested in starting a family. Never before had he thought of himself as a family man, but he found that he would love to have the chance to have children with Sally. She was changing him.

But before he could ask her where their relationship was going, he would have to confront her about their relationship as a whole. He would have to ask her how she felt about him and he would have to tell him how he felt about her, and he had never quite managed to admit to himself that he was in love with her. How would he be able to say something like that out loud?

So the affair continued in secret and it continued to be more about a quick fuck than anything else. He couldn't say he minded that completely- she was easily the best he had ever had, and it only seemed to get better with time. And they did talk a little bit, and whenever they did, they never ran out of things to say. He didn't mind their relationship the way it was at all, he just couldn't help but wonder if it would ever become something more.

Yes, Sally was changing him into something that he had never thought he would be. He still carried out his hero work efficiently, but the brutality went down more and more as he found himself having less frustrations to work out. There was the part of him that suddenly wanted children, too, and the part of him that looked forward to just getting a chance to hold her, the part that thought he wouldn't mind if they didn't have sex every time they met up.

He wondered if Sally could see the difference in him and if that would help sway her, show her that he was more worthy of the title of her husband than the man who currently held it. He wanted to know if she would be with him and he wanted her to know that he loved her, more than he had ever loved anyone.

And finally, he could not wait anymore for her to reveal the true nature of their relationship. He had to know and he swallowed his nerves to confront her. "When are things going to change?" he asked.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, with you and me and Larry. When are we gonna stop doin' this in secret?"

She stared at him as if she couldn't believe what he was asking. "That's not going to change," she said simply. "You know we can't tell anyone about us and I can't leave Larry, especially not for you. Think of how that would look!"

"What does that have to do with anything?" he asked, already feeling himself grow angry.

"It has to do with everything. You know I'm trying to get into movies. How would it look if I married my agent and then left him for one of my old hero friends who got thrown out of the group? People would just start asking questions about what happened to you in the Minutemen again, and then people would find out what had happened between us. And that's not even mentioning the people who already know. What on earth would _they_ think of me if they knew?"

She said all of this as if it were simple fact, as if Eddie should have known all along and that he was stupid for not figuring it out sooner. But it had not been simple to him and he didn't think himself stupid for expecting Sally to value him a little bit more than her public image. Maybe he was stupid, then, but he didn't care.

He knew how he thought things should be, and he felt himself grow even angrier at the woman in front of him. How could she treat him like this when she was the only thing he cared about besides himself? How could she change him in the ways she had and then not realize how special their relationship was? He could feel his temper rising and wanted to grab her and shake her and tell her exactly why she was wrong.

But then he remembered the fear in her eyes when she had first invited him in and the fear in her eyes when he had attacked her years before, and he knew that he never wanted to see her like that again. Maybe she was right, talking about how it would look for her to be with him. Maybe he still did not deserve her. Maybe he would be doing her a favor by backing down and playing along, no matter how much he hated it.

Eddie was not a weak man and he had never been one to give in. He got his way, and he got it when he wanted it. But where Sally was concerned, he felt like he would always be helpless when it came to giving her what she wanted, both because of how much he loved her and because he was still trying to make up for the time when he did not listen to what she wanted.

"Hey, I was just jokin'," he said, at last. "I know how bad it would look, and I mean, it's not like we're really serious or nothin', right?" He laughed because he knew if he didn't, he might instead take it all back and beg her.

"Right," she said, and he pretended that it didn't hurt to hear her say that. What did it really matter if their relationship meant nothing? It wasn't about him, it was about her, and that much had been clear from the beginning. Better to sit back and accept that than risk losing her all over again.

He found that he didn't really care how he had her, as long as he had her, and so he would allow things to continue like that for as long as she wanted. And if she ever asked him to go, he wouldn't be able to fight her on that. He would leave and he would stay away because he owed her that. Eddie didn't think he would ever stop owing her.

 **A/N: Next chapter is probably going to be the last affair chapter because, as much as I'd like to draw it out, I can't. Sorry if he looks too sympathetic here, I'm trying not to make him like that, but it's hard not to when I'm trying to portray Sally the way I feel like she is. I dunno, I just don't think either of them would be good for each other, but I definitely think she would be pretty toxic herself. Neither one of them are really good,**


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: The end of the affair approaches! More of my bullshit love story. It's almost over, I promise.**

That became Eddie's routine as the year drug on and switched over. It was 1949, and he hadn't been able to see Sally during the holidays. She had to play house with he real husband and Eddie had spent the season by himself, remembering the Christmas party nearly a decade before.

He remembered the way Sally had hung off him after she saw the earrings, the way she wore them with pride after that, the way she had kissed him just before she went home that night. She didn't know that he knew this, but he had found the earrings in his dresser one night after she had fallen asleep. He wondered if she ever still wore them, but either way, she had hung onto them.

His memories were the only thing he had to keep him company that Christmas, and he realized that, once again, Sally was the only person in his life he could really call his friend. His work didn't leave him with much time to socialize, and what time he had he spent on Sally or by himself, because he really didn't enjoy socializing that much in the first place.

It had been nearly ten years since he had left Louisville and his family. He was a completely different man now, but he was no less alone, and if it weren't for the woman he had fallen in love with, he would be okay with that. If it weren't for her, he would be the only person that mattered to him, and that was how it had always been.

It had been nearly ten years since he had decided to make something of himself, and he was not disappointed in what he had become. It had been a rocky start with his factory work and the issues with the Minutemen, but to look back now and know that he was more popular and successful than any of them and that the factory job had had nothing to do with it was very satisfying. He was more than just somebody now; he was an American hero.

With how far he had come, it was almost acceptable that he had failed to get the girl. He had achieved so much else that anyone would say that Sally was a fool for not choosing him and that it was no loss. And, really, he did have her more than her husband did, even if it was entirely private and not all that he wanted. What did he have to complain about? He was a hero and he did well for himself and he didn't even need what little he had of Sally.

By the time the holidays had passed and the new year had begun, he had almost convinced himself that that were the case. There was nothing that Sally really had to offer him but some nostalgic yearning for his first love, and even that would have to fade eventually. Loving her was one thing, but letting the fact that she did not feel the same get to him was another, and he resolved not to care as much anymore.

~X~

He was able to keep up that sentiment throughout their first few encounters of the new year. At first, seeing her only stirred up the same old feelings, but then he reminded himself that she was doing him no favors and that if anyone was out of anyone's league here, it was him. He was an American hero and she was a failed actress.

It was not that he stopped loving her. At this point, he didn't think that was possible, but it was at least possible for him to pretend he didn't, and when he pretended, he felt a hell of a lot better about going to see her. Everything was looking up, and it was great not having to care.

Then, one day, she was nervous. He tried to ask her what was wrong, and she refused to answer, denying that there was a problem to begin with. The next few times he went to see her, this persisted, until she broke down.

"We can't keep seeing each other," she said, abruptly.

"I...what?" He wondered if he had misheard her.

"We can't!" she said, looking more panicked than she had when she had first realized how far they had gone. "We have to stop seeing each other, okay? We just have to."

"Sally, what the fuck is going on?" he asked, trying to keep his voice steady and calm her down.

She laughed bitterly. "We fucked up, alright? We fucked up really bad and now everything's about to blow up in our faces and it'd be better if we just broke it off now and said it was one time, alright?"

"Did Larry find out or somethin'?"

"He will," she replied vaguely. "He will, and I know he'll forgive me if I say it was once, but he's going to be looking for evidence that it wasn't and you just can't keep coming here anymore!"

"Would you just tell me what the hell is wrong?" he shouted, frustrated with the way she danced around the subject.

"I'm pregnant," she deadpanned. "I'm pregnant, alright? Because I believe that bullshit you fed me about it being 'okay every once in a while' and that if you just 'pulled out most of the time' nothing would happen! God, I knew we should have used something."

"But I'm Catholic," he argued weakly, because that part of her statement was a lot easier to respond to than the main point. And it was true that there was a part of him that was reluctant to use contraceptives due to his upbringing, but there was another part that knew he didn't even go to church, so what did one more sin matter?

"Eddie, he's going to find out," she said. "He's going to know I've not been faithful. He and I haven't...not even once, he's going to know it isn't his."

Finally, he was able to process the true implications of what she was saying. She was pregnant with his child. They were going to have a child together. One of his most secret wishes had happened and suddenly, all of the things he had told himself about Sally recently disappeared because she had something to offer him. She was no longer just his first love who didn't appreciate him, she was the mother of his child.

"So what?" he asked. "Let him know. Sal, this changes everything. Fuck what everyone else thinks and leave him! We don't need anyone else, anyway. I make plenty of money, I can take care of you and our kid."

"You know I can't do that, Eddie," she replied. "You know damn well that I can't do something like that!"

"Why the fuck not?" he snapped. "You're miserable with Larry. He does nothing for you, you don't owe him a damn thing. Meanwhile I've been doin' whatever it takes to make you happy for a goddamn year now without any appreciation, but you're too scared to be with me because of what a buncha assholes might think! And you're gonna try to keep me away from my fuckin' kid because of it too, right?"

"That's exactly right," said Sally, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, but we just can't..."

"No, Sal, we can. We can but you're too stubborn to see that because you're more concerned with your image, which, jokes on you, honey! Ya don't even have one anymore! You're nobody, you never made it as an actress and ya never will, and ya only ever made headlines as a hero, which you can't do anymore cos you got yourself knocked up by a guy ya won't even marry because of that goddamn, nonexistent image!" By the end, he was shouting, letting out all the anger that had built up over the course of their affair.

The hurt on her face did not last long before turning to anger. He realized, too late, that he had said too much in his anger, that he had let his temper get the best of him again, and that this had ruined his relationship with Sally again. "Get the fuck out of here," she said. "Get the fuck out of my house and don't ever come back, you hear me? I'll raise _my_ child with my husband, and if he leaves me over this, I'll raise them by myself before I let a creep like you in their life, Eddie Blake."

"Sally, wait, please, I didn't-"

"I said get out of here," she interuppted. "If you don't go, I'll call the police and I'll call Larry and as many of the Minutemen as I can get a hold of, and they'll all vouch for me when I tell them what you did to me. And then I'll tell them you did it again and got your way this time. Go."

He wanted to say something to make what he had already said disappear. He wanted to do anything that would get that hurt and angry look out of her eyes, the look he had spent so long fixing. He wanted to change her mind on everything, or at least change her mind enough that he would be able to be a part of his child's life. But Sally would not back down and her words had reminded him why he always let her get her way.

If she wanted him to leave forever, if she wanted him to never know his child, he would have to respect that. He would have to listen to her and give her what she wanted, because he would never stop owing her.

Without another word, he left through the back door, just as he always had.

~X~

At some point that year, the Minutemen disbanded. Eddie didn't know why and he didn't particularly care, but he was sure it had something to do with the fact that Ursula and Bill were dead and that Sally, now pregnant, would definitely not be returning. Mothman had had a drinking problem for years and they couldn't keep the sexualities of Hooded Justice and Captain Metropolis a secret forever, especially not without Larry finding ways to cover for them.

It had only been a matter of time, but he couldn't help but feel very pleased when he found out that they were no more. The four of them were still active on their own, but they were nobodies without the kind of connections Eddie had. He was more than they would ever be.

Later still, Sally gave birth to Eddie's daughter, though the details were vague. Everything he knew about her pregnancy came from the papers, and she was so insignificant now that the pieces on her were short and gave few details. He didn't even know the little girl's name, only that she had been born, healthy and strong.

It hurt, how much he wanted to meet her and how much he didn't want to want to meet her. He wanted to respect Sally's wishes and he wanted to not care about the situation at all, but there was still a pathetic part of him that loved that little girl as much as he loved Sally.

He wanted to be her father, even though he knew that it wouldn't work. Being with Sally may have changed him temporarily, but, in the long run, he had not lost his temper but it had lost him his chance at that life. If it hadn't been that, something else would have ruined it and he knew it. He could only pretend to be a different sort of man for so long; eventually, his true self would show again. So he reverted back to the way he had been before, brutal with the criminals he faced, finding any excuse to hurt them as much as possible.

If he looked at it from an outsider's perspective, it was really funny, just how he and Sally had played each other with him pretending to be better than he was and her pretending to need him. And even though he hated being the butt of the joke, he loved getting the last laugh, even when it was at his own expense. So whenever he happened to think about it, he laughed.

 **A/N: Alright, the affair is over and I have to move on with the story. Probably going to cover a lot of years in a short amount of time, because not a lot happens in the 50s. But, hey, it's whatever.**


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: And now we're coming into the 50s and some implied stuff that I'm exploring my headcanons on. Also some headcanons that have nothing to imply them at all, just stuff I wrote. Merry Christmas.**

Life went on for Eddie and a new decade began. In the wake of America's final stand in the war, nuclear tension had been prevalent, but Eddie had been too concerned with his own affairs to concern himself with that. His handlers kept him somewhat informed of the goings-on, but he was not a scientist. His job was to keep the streets clear of the more complicated criminals, not worry about the consequences of an atomic bomb.

Of these criminals, there was a man who called himself Moloch. There weren't many "villains" left active these days. They had abandoned the costumed lifestyle before most of the heroes, jumping ship before it became obsolete. The other heroes were quickly learning how obsolete they were too, but, being the government's hero had its advantages and that was not something Eddie had to learn. He was still famous and still respected, even as the villains he was supposed to fight disappeared.

Moloch was different, but barely. He never abandoned his magician persona, but even he stopped with the larger-than-life, doomed-to-fail-doomsday schemes, preferring a more practical sort of crime. Even with his costume and alias, he was still hardly different from any other major criminal at that time, running vice dens and drug rings of all sorts, operating from the shadows until Eddie came bursting in to give him a fight.

The problem with magicians was that it was all tricks, all sleight of hand and clever manipulation. They relied on the sort of people who tried to see past the tricks and outsmart them or the type who fell for them wholly. Eddie was neither; he was observant but he was more of a fighter than a strategist.

Rather than worry about the nature of the tricks, he just accepted that they were all fake and barreled in, ignoring whatever the magician had to throw at him. In no time, he'd have him apprehended, and every time he escaped, Eddie would always show up to repeat the process. It was an annoying routine, but it was some of his more regular interaction, and he found himself not minding as much as he normally would have.

More often than not, when it came down to the beating, he went a little easy on Moloch, not wanting to hurt the other man too bad. It would mean another fight in the future, and that was something he could look forward to. It was nice to have at least one person in his life he could count on, after all.

~X~

In 1952, he was told by one of his handlers that the government was growing uncomfortable where vigilantes were concerned. Not with him, of course- they knew where his loyalties were and they knew how to find him. It was the former members of the Minutemen, the four remaining costumed adventurers, still active in New York City, that concerned them.

With so many international concerns, they felt that having mysterious men running around doling out justice might not be the best thing, in terms of national security. It would be far better if they at least knew the men behind the masks, and hearings were arranged by the House UnAmerican Activities Committee.

After an initial unmasking, there would be an investigation into their lives to determine whether or not they were to be trusted. If anything unusual popped up, they would be more thoroughly searched for any connections that may suggest that they had Red sympathies.

Eddie thought the whole ordeal was a little excessive, considering what the men all stood for, and figured that if they thought someone like Captain Metropolis was a Commie, then what chance did anyone else have? But he knew that Hooded Justice had to be from somewhere in Europe, and the thought that he might be convicted as a result of the hearing made him a little bit more eager.

He had never forgiven the other man for what had happened after the incident with Sally. It was a grudge that some part of him knew shouldn't exist; it was entirely his fault, what he had done to her, and he had never been able to hold on to her, anyway, but he still wanted some revenge.

Maybe if HJ hadn't come in, he would have been able to apologize to Sally sooner, right then and there. Maybe he wouldn't have been thrown out of the Minutemen and not allowed to see her and make things right. Maybe he would have been able to fix everything before it was too late and maybe she would have never gotten married to someone else in the first place. His mistakes were his own fault, but the fact that he hadn't been able to fix them? He would always blame that on Hooded Justice.

So he awaited the results of the hearing eagerly. He was told that he would be allowed to read all of the documents pertaining to them and give his insight based on his knowledge from working with them. If he noticed anything unusual, he was to report it. He doubted he would find anything unusual, but he would be lying if he said he didn't have plans to make things as hard on HJ as possible.

When the reports came in, however, there was nothing on HJ. He had not showed up for his questioning and, though they searched for him, they found no reliable leads. Eddie was very angry that he had given them all the slip, but he was not willing to let the idea rest just yet. He knew more than the government did and he was not stupid; given time, he could find him.

Meanwhile, he took in the information he was given about his other teammates. Nite Owl was a local cop by the name of Hollis Mason and Captain Metropolis was Nelson Gardner, a Marine. They were both dismissed pretty quickly, due to their upstanding backgrounds.

Mothman, on the other hand, was an entirely different matter. Byron Lewis was an incredibly smart man- had to be, to figure out how to fly like that- but he had a questionable background. In college, it seemed that he had made several more liberal friends, and was rumored to have been a supporter of socialism in his time. This, coupled with his declining mental state, made the investigation that much harder on him.

Eddie knew damn well that Mothman wasn't any more of a Communist spy than the rest of the former Minutemen. He knew that the man was nothing more than a coward, and whatever he had done in college meant nothing. The remarks he made expressing fear about war told Eddie that he was not the sort to risk his life over any sort of ideals. It all meant nothing.

But Mothman had voted him out of the Minutemen and taken away his chance to fix things with Sally as well. He was not quite as guilty as Hooded Justice, but he _was_ still guilty, and Eddie didn't say anything at first. He kept silent on the matter, answering any questions about Byron's character with, "I don't remember him all that well. I'll let ya know if I think of anything useful." He would take delight in reading reports that stated Byron was becoming increasingly more nervous and his behavior more erratic, until he finally decided to speak up.

"I don't think he's got anything to do with all of that," he finally said. "I mean, he never said anything like that around us, never seemed the type to seek out conflict." They were hesitant at first, but with Eddie vouching for him and no concrete evidence supporting real Communist affiliations, they eventually let Byron off.

Eddie could have let it go further and even sway things so that Byron was convicted, but he decided that the man had suffered enough. He hadn't had too much of a part in Eddie's problems; he was mostly guilty of being a coward and had probably gone along with what everyone else was saying to avoid conflict.

But, having that small taste of revenge only made him want more. He didn't know when or how, but he knew that he would have to do something against Nelson Gardner and Hollis Mason someday, and he had not given up on his plans to track down Hooded Justice. Already, he had a good idea of where to start searching.

~X~

The funny thing was, he was asked if he wanted to be involved in an investigation on HJ's whereabouts but he said no. He claimed that he had nothing to contribute to the search and that he would prefer to go back to his normal work. At some point, he had decided that, if he were going to pursue his revenge, it would be better to do it on his own terms. Having the government involved would only complicate things and make what he had planned harder to cover up.

At first, he had only wanted to rough the guy up, let him know exactly who he had tangled with, but the more he thought about it, the more his past anger returned and soon, he felt that merely making the man suffer a bit was not the proper way to get back at him. For what he had done, Hooded Justice deserved much worse.

The first step in his plan was to discover the man's true identity. A challenge, certainly, but not one that he thought would hold him back for long. He knew more than most, after all, and he knew that Metropolis had been in a relationship with him. According to what he had learned during his affair with Sally, that relationship had lasted up until she retired, so it was safe to assume that the two were close.

There were not many Nelson Gardner's in the city, and he found the one he was looking for after a little bit of digging around. He was a rich man, with a large house, and hardly any security. Certainly nothing Eddie couldn't get past and, once he learned the older man's routines, the break in took him no time at all.

He began his search in Nelson's bedroom, and after an hour of fruitless searching, finally struck gold. In the bottom of one of his drawers, buried beneath normal clothes, was his costume, and underneath that was a stack of paper. Upon reading the first one, it became obvious that these were unsent letters addressed to someone by the name of Rolf.

 _I don't know why I'm even bothering writing this_ , the first one read. _If anything, it's only me writing things down that I shouldn't and gives us more of a chance of being caught. But there is no us, anymore, is there? I'd be the only one caught, wouldn't I?_

 _And there's the real reason why I don't know why I'm writing this. How on earth would I ever send it to you? You'll never read this. You'll never have to hear anything from me anymore, because you're gone and you didn't tell me where you were going or why you were going or even that you were going at all. I wonder if you even thought about how much that would hurt me._

 _Maybe you did and you liked that. You always did like to hurt me, but you know I only liked it physically, you know I hated it when you tried to hurt my feelings. Why the hell did you leave? I know things were rough at the end and I know you'd been buying boys, but I was willing to fix things. I was. You knew that you were all I had and you left and now I'm writing this stupid letter to nobody._

 _The worst part is, even if I could send this to you, it'd just make things worse. You hated the way I nagged at you about things, but sometimes I really was just looking out for you. I know I was pushy in the relationship, but it was hard with what we did. Always having to pretend to be someone else so the public wouldn't know. But I wanted to be with you and I still do._

The letter went on for a while, and the others were similar in nature. All of them whining at this Rolf for disappearing without a word and begging him to come back so they could work things out. It was so painfully obvious that this Rolf was Hooded Justice that Eddie could hardly believe how easy it had been.

Nelson must not have considered just how incriminating his knowledge was or trusted that his friends who knew would never use this against him. But Eddie was not his friend and he had unfinished business to settle, and now he had the first piece of the puzzle. He was confident that the others would soon fall into place.

~X~

He had only a first name to go on, but he was confident that he had the skill to find a man based off that alone. Rolf was not a common name at that time, and even in a big city like New York, it would be easy to narrow down the search eventually.

Once again, however, things came to Eddie more easily than expected. He wondered if luck was on his side because he was in the right, because HJ really did have it coming, but he had long stopped believing in right and wrong, and dismissed that idea altogether; black and white morality like that was nothing but a setup for a punchline that had always annoyed him.

In any case, he came upon information about a circus performer, a strongman, who just happened to be named Rolf and who just happened to have stopped showing up to perform around the time of the HUAC hearings. The likelihood of this being a coincidence was too slim, and once Eddie saw a photo of this strongman, he knew that there was no way it could be. He would know that build anywhere and for someone to have beaten him so senseless back then? That man would have had to be incredibly strong.

There was no doubt in his mind that this Rolf and Nelson's Rolf were one and the same, and that Rolf was Hooded Justice. The only thing that remained was to find where the missing man had disappeared to, but it was much easier to track a man with a name and a face than a hooded vigilante, and though it was easy to hide in the city, he had military-level espionage training and one hell of a grudge.

It took him half a year, but he eventually found where Rolf was hiding, using a fake name and hiding his accent a little bit better and working in a grocery store. And then Eddie waited in the man's apartment, poised to strike. He might have been strong enough to beat up a teenaged Eddie, but things had changed and he had the element of surprise.

"Hi there, Max," he said, when the man had returned home. "Or, should I say Rolf? Nah, that's never what I knew ya as. I should probably stick to HJ, huh?"

"You-!" He was stunned to see Eddie in his home, that much was clear, but he did not hesitate long before lunging.

Eddie was quicker now and he dodged, laughing as HJ crashed into the wall behind him. "Ya know, I was wonderin' somethin'. Heard from a friend that you'd started seein' some young men out on the docks. How'd Nelly feel about that?" He briefly touched his gun as he debated whether he would end this quickly or allow the fight to drag on a bit. "He misses ya, by the way."

His desire for full revenge won out, and he allowed HJ to stand before he struck, once again quick enough to catch him off guard. HJ was definitely stronger than him, but he was slowing in his age and had the disadvantage of not being prepared for the fight.

"That old friend I mentioned?" Eddie taunted. "It was Sally. Saw a lot of her recently, no thanks to you and that exclusive little club you used to play around with. Thanks for throwin' me out, by the way, my life's been pretty great since then."

As he teased and insulted the man, he sidestepped every blow and returned what he could. "By the way, got another burnin' question. How'd it feel, sittin' there with your boyfriend and votin' Ursula out? Bet that felt real nice, some classic Minutemen spirit! Look, I hate to be the one to say this, buddy, but I think you've gotten some bad karma over the years. Better watch out or that just might come back to bite your ass." He drew his gun.

Hooded Justice never stood a chance.

 **A/N: I mean, yeah. That's that. Dude but like I gotta start researching history and stuff soon because Eddie's gotta become more political soon. Nixon's about to be elected Vice President and he and Eddie were BFF and all...**


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N: It's so weird for me to write Richard Nixon as a character but it's essential to the story. Luckily I've been reading a book about him lately (because Austin Grossman is best writer) and at least don't feel totally weird writing about him. I'm just pretending it's the Nixon from Crooked, minus all the occult stuff that actually makes it that book. So just. That Nixon. But in Watchmen.**

In the previous year, Dwight D. Eisenhower had been elected president, and then, after his inauguration in 1953, Eddie received an invitation to Washington from his vice president, a man by the name of Richard Nixon. Eddie didn't really know much about him; he had heard that the man had been a senator or something before, but he hadn't paid much attention to the election.

Of course, he had voted for Eisenhower. There were few who didn't, what with his reputation at the time as a war hero, and it made him the most obvious choice. But he had voted more out of obligation than anything else- being a symbol for patriotism meant doing things like that- and he knew nothing about Nixon.

Needless to say, he was a little bit surprised upon receiving that invitation. He had met Truman and his vice president once, when he had first started working for the government, but that had been the extent of their interactions. He hadn't expected much of anything out of the newly elected pair.

His travel expenses were paid for, of course, and he made the trip only a day after receiving the invitation. He was welcomed very warmly and given a fantastic hotel room that he was able to drop his one suitcase off at before he left again to go meet Richard Nixon.

When he was let into the office and took a seat, the older man behind the desk smiled at him and said, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Comedian. Ah, may I call you, Mr. Blake?"

"Eddie's fine, actually," he replied. "Pleasure to meet ya, too, Mr. Vice President."

"Well, if we're going to be informal about names, Dick's fine," said the vice president. "And I'd like it if we were informal about that. I've been following your work for a while, Eddie, and I've wanted to meet you for a very long time."

Eddie could smell ambition from a mile away, having lived off it and having used it to get to where he was, and this man reeked of it. "Is that right, Dick?"

"That's right," he said, without missing a beat. "I was thinking the two of us could be friends. Maybe you could come to some events with me sometime, maybe posing as a bodyguard. I've got plenty of those, of course, but imagine the publicity both of us could get from that!"

He nodded, even though he didn't give a damn about the publicity Nixon had to offer him. If he wanted to make headlines, he had no trouble doing that himself. Still, it didn't hurt to humor Dick, and there was always a chance he could get more of him in the long run if he played along now. "Sounds like a blast," he said with a smirk. "Do I gotta wear a suit?"

"Well, we'll leave the details up to the future," said Dick. "But I'm sure it depends on the nature of the events. Sometimes, it'd probably be fine for you to wear your costume, and other times, you'd need to be a little more formal."

"Okay, but you'll have to let me know a good place to pick one up, if that's the case. Don't have a single suit to my name."

"Oh, we'll see to any needs you might have in that department, don't you worry." The promise of a free suit was small, but it was something. Already, Eddie could see that becoming an intimate friend of the vice president was going to beneficial to him, even more so than the government connections he already had.

~X~

He stayed in Washington for a week after that, accompanying Nixon to a few events and getting acquainted with several people while there. After he returned to New York, he got back in the swing of things, working on whatever difficult cases the government threw at him and taking down Moloch whenever he arrived with a new scheme.

Over the next few years, tension continued to grow between the US and the Soviet Union, and Nixon kept Eddie much more in the know than he had previously been. Still, he tried not to think about those things when he could avoid it. Unless they were going to send him over there to take care of it, he didn't like to worry about the what-ifs.

He only worried about what directly concerned him but, in 1956, he came across something that did. It must have been a slow news week for someone like her to still be making the papers, though it was only a small piece, even smaller than the one that had announced the marriage. Sally Jupiter and Laurence Schexnayder had recently filed for divorce.

As soon as he saw the news, Eddie was not sure what to think. It had been seven years since Sally had thrown him out of her home, nine since their affair had begun, sixteen since he had ruined things with her the first time. It had been seven years since their daughter he had never met had been born, seven years believing that Larry was her father and not having a clue what was going on.

He wondered if this changed anything, if this meant that Sally would be more willing to talk to him without a husband looming over her. He wondered what had finally pushed the doomed marriage to the breaking point, and what was going to happen to her and the little girl now. There was only one way to find that out and he decided that he was going to give her a call.

Whatever had happened between her and Larry, she still lived in the same home, because she was the one who picked up the phone when he called. "Hello?"

"Hey, Sal, it's me," he said.

There was a pause where he heard her take a deep breath. "Eddie?"

"The one an' only."

"Why are you calling me?" she asked, sounding like she already had a pretty good idea.

"I heard about what happened. With you and Larry. I wanted to see how you were doin', after all that."

Sally snorted. "You're not that selfless. Why are you calling me?"

Though he knew she was right, he wasn't that selfless and he did have ulterior motives, it still stung to hear her say something like that so freely. "Well, I wanted to talk to ya too. I mean...with him outta the picture, I thought it would be easier."

"I'm not going to see you anymore," she replied, without missing a beat. "What happened between us is over and done."

"I know," he lied, hoping she couldn't sense that he had hoped she would change her mind. "But I still wanted to talk to you. I haven't approached you for seven years, because I respected your decision to not do anything to harm your marriage anymore. But now he's gone and I was just hopin'...we could finally talk about this mess."

She sighed and said, "I'm just not sure what there is for us to talk about. We had something, sure, but it didn't work out and it never would. We were always a mess, plain and simple."

"Maybe so, but your daughter's still my daughter," he replied. " _That's_ what I wanna talk about."

"I don't want you to be a part of her life," she said quickly. "She already believes that Larry's her father and she's taking all of this really hard...I'm not going to confuse her by letting some new man into her life. Especially not, you know...you."

"That's fair," he said, and he hated that it was. "I won't come see her or anythin', but...I just wanna know about her, ya know? All I know is that she's a girl, that's it."

"Her name is Laurel Jane Sche...Jupiter," she corrected herself. "She's very energetic and she loves animals and she's beautiful. She...she looks a lot like you, she's got your hair and...well, she's definitely got your temper and when she gets mad enough, she's the spitting image of you."

"That so?" He chuckled, trying to imagine what a tiny combination of him and Sally looked like while throwing a fit. Though he couldn't conjure an image, he knew that he loved the little girl in his imagination.

"I think that's part of why things happened like they did. Larry was angry at first, but he tried to forgive me, for the sake of image. You know how he was with that; he'd rather keep pretending to love me and pretend she was his daughter than leave me and have to answer questions about it. And I told him it was only once, so he went easier on me for that.

"But every day, she looked more and more like you, and it was no secret that she wasn't his. I mean, he knew she wasn't but...it must have been hard for him to pretend with the way she was growing up and he got more aggressive, kept lashing out at me more often and that upset Laurie so much. I would have tried to put up with it, but I'm not going to stand for someone bullying my daughter, so I left him." Her voice had turned shaky at some point during her story, but by the end, she spoke with a strong and confident clarity that Eddie admired.

"He didn't ever hurt her, did he? Did he ever hurt you? Cos I swear to God..."

"Not physically. He never hit either of us, he just...yelled a lot. But it's over now," she said. "I think I'm going to enjoy the single life for a while."

For the briefest moment, he considered asking her to come back to him, to present himself as a stepfather to Laurie and maybe tell her the truth when she was older, anything to allow him back into Sally's life. He could provide so much more for them than Larry and he knew it; he had always known it.

But he was busy with work and Sally had reminded him that nothing ever worked between them, so he didn't say anything. She had made her choices and he had made his, and it was much too late for them to do anything about it now.

"I really need to hang up," she said. "It's almost lunchtime and Laurie will be getting hungry soon..."

"Alright, go take care of our girl," he said, ignoring the sad sigh he received from Sally. "It was nice talkin' to ya, at least."

"It was nice," she replied. "I could...send you some photos of her, if you'd like?"

"Yeah...I'd like that."

 **A/N: Happy Thanksgiving, ya weenies. Next chapter...more stuff! More characters! Less bullshit love story! Yay!**


	15. Chapter 15

**A/N: Another decade, another chapter. The fifties come to a close this chapter, and some new characters are introduced.**

Laurie was more beautiful than he could have imagined. If Eddie had thought he was proud of her before, that was nothing compared to when he held that photograph in his hand. It was funny that he could still feel that sort of fatherly pride even when he had been denied the position of her father; he hadn't thought he would be capable of giving a damn about something he had no part in. This was the only possible exception, he supposed.

She did bear a resemblance to him, and he could certainly imagine the little girl having one hell of a temper. But her eyes looked so much like Sally's that it hurt to look at them. He couldn't tell from the black and white image what color they were- Sally's minty green or his icy blue- but just the spark in them reminded him so much of her that he wouldn't doubt for a second that this was Sally's daughter.

Not for the first time, he wished he could meet her in person and just have a few minutes with her. He didn't know what he would say or do if he actually had that time, but he couldn't help wishing for it all the same. Sentimentalities were not common in his life, and he had grown to care about very little, but he didn't think he would ever be able to stop caring about Sally or the daughter he could never know.

~X~

In 1957, the first new hero in a very long time hit the scene. It had been regarded as mostly a dying art, with Eddie one of the few still viewed as significant, so it was a bit of a surprise when a young man who called himself Ozymandias began regularly making the news.

He had targeted a lot of underground drug rings and had been fairly successful, considering how young and new to the field he was. Little was known about him or where he came from, and Eddie had never been one to enjoy being out of the loop. He decided he had to learn a little bit more about him and decide just what he thought about this Ozymandias.

His opportunity came to him one night when he had been following a lead on a case. The trail had gone cold and that had put him in a bad mood, but he kept following, just to be sure there was nothing there before he had to report failure. That was when he saw him, maybe following the same case- though not getting paid for it- or maybe after something completely different.

His purple and gold costume offered him no camouflage in the night and he stood out quite a bit. Of course, he was probably making no effort to hide at that moment either, and Eddie wouldn't let something like that cause him to underestimate the young man. He had heard enough about him to know that he was not one you would want to underestimate.

But Ozymandias hadn't noticed his approach yet, and Eddie decided to use that to his advantage. He had always been good at getting the drop on people, despite his brash personality, and he stealthily moved towards the young man, lunging to strike. Before he could make contact, the man had dodged and he was on the ground.

 _What the fuck ?_

"Should you really be attacking your allies?" asked Ozymandias, sounding so pompous that Eddie hated him instantly.

He stood and casually dusted himself off, as if he had meant to hit the ground like he had. "I don't see any allies 'round here. Just some tacky ass, pretty boy criminal. Now, tell me, sweetheart, what are ya up to?"

"Anyone who can read knows I'm not a criminal," he replied, looking insulted. "I know you're a brute, but I had assumed you could still read the newspaper."

"I only read the articles featurin' yours truly," Eddie retorted, smirking.

"Must be hard for you then. Those are becoming less and less frequent these days, aren't they?"

"I do alright," he replied, his voice just casual enough to disguise the fact that he was already preparing to body slam the young man, and so he was able to take him by surprise this time. Before he could react, Eddie had him pinned and landed a solid punch to his jaw.

"Still feelin' tough, pretty boy?" he asked, as Ozymandias struggled to break free. He was smarter than Eddie, and he was probably faster, but Eddie had his brute strength and, if it came down to it, he was armed. There was no way that he could lose, and he knew that. If he wanted to kill Ozymandias and eliminate the competition, he could do it right then and there, but he decided against it.

It wouldn't be worth it to try to cover up or get out of, even if he could convince people that he really had mistaken him for a criminal. Really, it would be enough, just knowing that he had beaten him and let it be known that he was still the best around, no matter what the new blood may think.

Just as he was thinking this, Ozymandias spat in his face, a combination of saliva and blood, and Eddie decided that one more strong hit would do him so good. He took great delight in the way the man's head snapped to the side, and then he let go of him, getting up and walking away. The hit had been hard enough to knock most people unconscious, and Ozymandias would at least be too groggy to follow him.

He wasn't sure when he would see him again, but he knew that he would always remember who had won that fight.

~X~

Eisenhower had been reelected and had kept Nixon as his running mate, so Eddie still had his connections with the White House. Even so, he supposed his handlers still would have told him about what happened in 1959 either way; it was such a major secret that it did not make sense for him to be left out about it.

A scientist had been involved in some sort of lab accident that had seemingly killed him and then come back later, completely different. Eddie had been shown some photographs and it was one of the strangest things he had seen in his life. The area around the man was fuzzy, as if he were glowing, and the man who showed it to him insisted that he was actually blue.

They didn't know the true extent of his new abilities yet, but what they did know was positively fearsome. He could destroy and rebuild things without touching them and teleport and talked about things as if he already knew what was going to happen. It was more horrifying than any atom bomb, and Eddie was terrified of him.

Just like with Hiroshima, he was more terrified than he would ever admit to anyone. Once again, there was something new being thrown into the mix, something that he didn't and couldn't understand, and it changed everything that he thought he knew about the world. It was more than he could handle and, once again, he decided not to let it bother him.

If this man was on his side, just as the bombs had been, he was not going to waste his time worrying about what could be. The world was going crazy, but the streets of New York still needed the Comedian, and Nixon still needed his fancy super hero guest, and Eddie's world was not going to be changed all that drastically. He wouldn't allow for something like that.

~X~

In 1960, Nixon announced that he would be running for president when Eisenhower's term was up and did very well in the Republican primaries while a man by the name of Kennedy made himself known as the Democratic candidate, but that was all eclipsed by a much bigger piece of news. The government had finally decided to go public about their strange blue man, introducing him under the codename 'Dr. Manhattan'.

The reaction was just as Eddie would have predicted: equal parts fear and awe, as people wondered what this would mean for the tension between the US and the Soviet Union as well as what it meant for humanity as a whole. There were a lot of questions, but there were few answers. He was introduced as a true super hero and was even sent out to fight crime every now and then, but it seemed clear that he had more important things to worry about.

Because he would not release a statement about his status as a crime fighter, reporters asked former Minutemen for their opinion on the subject. Eddie refused the interview, but saw that Nelson Gardner did not. He was almost surprised to see Sally appear, but then, she always did take every possible chance to pursue the spotlight.

She was older now and it was clear that she could not disguise her aging, but somehow, he couldn't help but think of her as beautiful, even with new lines in her face and her red hair looking more like it came from a bottle. So while the TV went on about Dr. Manhattan, Eddie wondered why he still hadn't managed to get over Sally.

~X~

The chance to meet this oddball came in the form of an invitation to some charity event of some sort. Apparently all of the remaining costumed adventurers had received an invitation, and Eddie was told that it would be best for him to make an appearance. That was the nice way of saying that this was part of his job too and, as much as he would prefer doing a number of other things, he had no choice in the matter.

He was sure that Dr. Manhattan was in the same boat, but he wondered why someone as powerful as that let his government handlers make decisions for him. From what Eddie had heard, he could kill them with no problem; he could kill of them with no problem. If it were him, he wouldn't let anyone boss him around. If it were him, he would do so much more.

Other than him, those in attendance were Captain Metropolis, Nite Owl, Mothman, and, interestingly enough, Ozymandias. It was the first time Eddie had seen him in person since beating the shit out of him and made sure to smile and wave when he walked past. The glare he received in return was absolutely priceless.

Hollis didn't look too pleased to see him either, while Byron didn't look completely there. Eddie didn't see him without a drink in his hand the entire night. He ignored Dr. Manhattan completely, deciding he wasn't going to give a damn what the blue freak thought of him or if he thought of him at all. Maybe they would speak that night and maybe they wouldn't, but if they did, he wouldn't be the one to initiate.

Instead, he went for Nelson, sidling up to him with a cigar in hand. "How's it goin', Nelly?" he asked, holding back a laugh at the surprised expression the Captain gave at being referred to by his real name.

"Uh, hello, Comedian," he said, trying to play that off. He already looked so nervous and uncomfortable that it almost took the fun out of taking the conversation further. Almost, but not quite.

"Looks like the years are treatin' ya...alright," replied Eddie, letting out a loud and fake laugh that he hoped conveyed his thoughts, which were _it may sound like that was a joke, but it wasn't_. The man was clearly getting more and more out of shape with age, and even though he tried to hide it, he was getting older.

"They're treating you a bit better, I suppose," said Nelson, laughing weakly because he too must know the truth behind his former teammate's words. "You look great."

"Better watch talking like that so openly," he chastised, feigning a scandalized expression. "Ya wouldn't want people to start to talk, would ya?"

"I...what do you mean by that?"

"Oh, nothin', just sayin' that some secrets are awfully hard to keep," he said, grinning almost menacingly. "Anyway, I gotta go mingle a little bit more. Be seein' ya, Nelly!" And with that, he trudged off into the crowd, chuckling to himself and letting Nelson sweat over his words.

He spent the rest of the night chatting it up with people he didn't know, asking him for stories about his time in the war and getting to meet the president and being good friends with the vice president and his time with the Minutemen and crime fighting, and he told them a lot of lies.

Dr. Manhattan said hello to him once that night and he gave a half-hearted wave in acknowledgment.

 **A/N: This story is starting to feel kinda lame...but I'm gonna try to keep going with it and power through, because I still have ideas for other things and I know how I'm going to end it. But the parts that I didn't think about writing are giving me fits.**


	16. Chapter 16

Later that year, the election was held and, despite winning the favor of the states, Nixon lost the election to Kennedy. Eddie knew the man was disappointed and that his pride was hurt, but he didn't say anything about it, preferring to move back home to California without a word. Kennedy was not as keen on Eddie, and so he lost some of his political connections for the time being.

That was fine; it had just been one small bonus. He would never lose his work as a government agent, not with how much useful he was and how the country was changing in the wake of the tension with the Soviet Union. It was a very different world than the one Eddie had introduced himself to when he had left home twenty years ago, and he wondered just how much things had changed there.

He was not a sentimental man and he did not miss his parents. Not once had he cared about the life he had left behind and not once had he missed that old world. But still, with everything changing as much as it was, with everything so different, with so much time gone, he could not subdue his curiosity.

With less work to do now that Nixon was gone, he decided to take a little vacation and visit Louisville. The trip was every bit as long and boring as he had remembered, but soon he was crossing into Kentucky, and the sights were still familiar even after two decades away. Things had changed, of course, but it was still the same middle American state he had been raised in. He was thirty six now.

Once he made it to Louisville, he wasn't sure where to start. He didn't remember his old home address and only vaguely recalled how to get there, but there was no telling if his parents still lived there, or if they were even alive at all. But he was resourceful; he was an agent, after all, and gathering information when he had nothing to go on was his profession.

He followed the streets he remembered from childhood and, soon enough, stood before the home he had grown up in. Eddie took down the address and then headed off in search of a phone book, flipping through it to look for any Blakes. Sure enough, he found the address listed next to Michael Morgan and F. Mary Blake- he gave a small chuckle, remembering that his mother's first name was Francis and that she hated it so much she went by her middle name.

So his parents still lived there, in the same house. Figuring that out had taken no time at all, and there wasn't much else he wanted to know. It wasn't as if he remembered any of his old classmates or cared enough about them to try to look them up. His vacation had only taken him a few hours, so now what?

He supposed that he could always knock on the door, but that meant that he would have to see his parents for the first time in a little over twenty years, and he had never once wanted to see them again. It wasn't as if they had put much work into finding him, it wasn't as if they had missed him either. He wouldn't be doing them any favors by dropping in; if anything, it would only spite them, and he supposed that was why he eventually did knock on the door.

His father opened the door, a hell of a lot older, but with a face so similar to Eddie's that there was no mistaking it was him. Still, he didn't look like he did half as much smiling, but the resemblance was still there enough that there was no denying the two were father and son. And the man clearly knew it, and looked ready to slam the door in Eddie's face and forget the whole thing happened.

Instead, he just scoffed and said, "Didn't expect the _Comedian_ to drop by." He said it like he was swearing, intentional and bitter.

"Dunno what you're talkin' about, old man," replied Eddie.

"Like hell you don't. Ya really think your own father wouldn't recognize you in that ridiculous costume? Ya think that mask actually hides any of your features?" His father shook his head.

"If ya think that costume is bad, you should see the one I wore before they made me change it," he said with a slight laugh. His father did not crack a smile. Typical. He and Eddie had never shared a sense of humor.

"Why are you here?" asked the older man, cutting to the chase. "Did it take ya twenty damn years to remember where your house was or somethin'?"

"Did it take _you_ twenty years to notice I was gone?" Eddie shot back. "S'not like ya came lookin' for me or anything."

"Oh, but I did. Your mother was worried sick about you, and we looked the whole city over for months, the state for years. But after a while, ya start to realize how big the world is and I told her that ya must not want to be found. How the hell are we supposed to know where our ungrateful son decided to run off to?"

"Anywhere beat the hell outta here."

"I'm sure it did," said his father, shaking his head. "I'm sure it was all worth puttin' your mother through all that. Though I don't see why she worried herself over it, it was better than havin' to put up with you. And then, lo and behold, we turn on the TV one day and there's Edward, all grown up and some kinda war hero. It broke her heart all over again, ya know?"

"If you're tryin' to guilt me over this, don't bother. Things turned out pretty great for me. So what if I had to burn a few bridges to get here?" Not once during the conversation had Eddie stopped smirking. He didn't buy his father's sob story for a minute, nor did he give a damn if it was true or not.

"I think you should go before-"

"Michael, who's out there?" As if on cue, his mother interrupted, walking up and trying to peer around her husband to see who was at the door.

"It's no one," he said, trying to nudge her back.

"It's your little boy, come home from war," Eddie said with a snicker, just as his mother managed to shove Michael out of the way. She gasped, recognizing him instantly.

"Edward?"

"I mostly go by the Comedian nowadays, but Eddie works too," he replied. She walked out the door, approaching him on the porch. Rather than giving him a tight and teary embrace, like what would have happened in the movies, she raised a hand and slapped him across the face.

"You've got a lot of nerve, showin' your face here after all these years!" she shrieked, loud enough that the neighbors could hear, but for once she didn't seem as concerned with what they thought of her.

Of course, her dainty little slap barely stung, but he still made a show of rubbing his cheek and groaning. "Damn, you pack a mean hit. Maybe they shoulda hired you to be America's professional hero."

"Get the hell out of here," she spat. "If you wanted to come back, you had a lot of time to do it, and you didn't. You have no idea how bad you made _me_ look, and-"

"Well, I wouldn't wanna hurt your precious image anymore than I already have," he said, cutting her off. "God knows ya'd be nothin' without it. Catch you motherfuckers later...'cept, I probably won't." He let out a loud laugh as he turned around without waiting for a response and started down the driveway.

"And don't you ever come back here!" his father called after him.

"You're no son of ours," his mother added in a melodramatic shriek. Eddie just kept on laughing.

~X~

The next day, he attended Mass at his old church, but he felt just as out of place as he did when he was a teenager, except now he was bulky and hadn't packed any of his nicer clothes, so he looked just as out of place as he felt. He would have tried doing a confession, but he had too many years piled up, and he wasn't even sure if he wanted to atone for any of that anyway. He figured you had to be sorry to do something like that.


	17. Chapter 17

The night before he left Louisville, Eddie decided to go drinking, because what else could he really do? His vacation was almost over, after all, and he owed himself at least a little bit of enjoyment out of this trip. So that was how he found himself sitting next to a woman he vaguely recognized at the bar.

She was older than him, by about ten years, and not exactly unattractive, but it was clear that her years of beauty had come to an end. He was shameless in how he looked her over, trying to determine where he knew her from, when she noticed him, and wore a similar expression of vague recognition.

"I'm sorry if this is a strange question to ask, but...is your name Edward by any chance?" she asked.

"Sure is," he replied, and then it dawned on him who she was. "Miss Johnson, right? Unless that's changed of course." He chuckled. She had been a young teacher at his school the year he had run away, the subject of a lot of flirting from him and his classmates, given the fact that they didn't see many young, pretty girls at their boys' school.

And she had been pretty back then, and, though Eddie had mostly hit on her jokingly, he had always appreciated her looks just as much as the next guy. She had red hair and he wondered if he had had a type even back then. It was clear that she had aged, but so had he, and so had everyone else he'd known.

"It's still 'miss'," she said, not without a hint of sadness to her voice that he was sure he was not meant to hear. "But enough about me, what exactly happened to you? You just stopped showing up to school one day, and then your parents reported you missing but...they said they never found you."

"Well, I didn't really wanna be found," he said with a shrug. "Figured it was high time I got outta here, so I did. This is the first time I been back since. Nice surprise to see such a pretty face from the past."

To his amusement, she actually blushed at his flattery. "Well, I can't say things weren't easier on us teachers without you around picking fights with everyone, but I'm glad to see you were okay all that time."

"I'm better than okay now," he replied. "Why doncha lemme buy ya a drink?" And of course she agreed, and of course she insisted he call her Daisy, and of course he invited her back to his hotel, and of course she agreed to it. It wasn't that he really wanted her in particular, it was just that she was available and he had been horny enough, and that he thought it would be damn hilarious.

It was, in fact, damn hilarious, knowing that he had bagged the former hot teacher that his classmates had lusted after so openly, and that she had turned out so lonely and desperate that she would fuck a former student like him, one that she had never particularly cared for back then. All in all, it was a good end to the vacation, and he felt he had gotten the enjoyment he owed himself on his trip.

He made sure to wake up early in the morning, leaving her instructions for checking out of his room before beginning the trip back to Manhattan.

~X~

While he continued to stay on top in terms of heroics, the former Minutemen just kept on falling apart. It made headlines when, in 1962, Byron Lewis, now publicly revealed to be Mothman, was declared insane and locked up for his own good. Eddie felt the smallest hint of pride, knowing that the pressure he had allowed to be put on the man had had something to do with it.

And the hits just kept coming when, later that year, Nite Owl announced his retirement. Eddie regretted not being the one to push him to that, but he figured he could always figure out some other way to get Hollis back. It wasn't long, however, before a new Nite Owl made himself known on the streets, this one with more gadgets and a less revealing costume.

If the fact that the new generation was growing and that Hollis Mason had a true successor was supposed to make Eddie feel old, it didn't. He still felt just as proud of himself that he had stayed relevant, that he was one of the last two Minutemen, and the only one who had actually amounted to anything. Whatever Nelson was doing, it was nothing compared to him. If he was supposed to feel old, it wasn't working; he felt in his prime.

When the news came that Nixon, who had tried to run for governor in California, had yet again lost an election, Eddie decided to give his old friend a call, and that was when he was invited to California. He agreed to go, knowing that Dick wouldn't have invited him out there just for a chat.

He arrived at the address they had given him to have Pat open the door, smiling at him in that reserved way she smiled at all of her husband's political contacts. It was painfully obvious that their marriage had suffered during Dick's time in Washington, but Eddie didn't really consider himself one to judge since he had fucked up the closest thing he'd ever had to a real relationship.

There were times when he considered making passes at her, just to see how she would react, just to see if she were really as lonely as she appeared, but even he wasn't that fucked up. He doubted he could actually stoop so low as to fuck a friend's wife, even for the sake of a good laugh. Even if he doubted that there was any love left in that marriage.

He sat down to talk with her and Dick, until eventually Dick politely asked her if she needed to check on the kids. Their daughters were both in high school and definitely did not need their mother checking up on them, but Pat nodded and left the room. She knew by now when their was private business being discussed and she knew better than to put up a fight about not being able to listen to it.

"Eddie, I was wondering how you felt about all of this...election business lately," said Dick.

"Pretty big mess, I'd say," replied Eddie. "That's twice now for ya. It's gotta hurt."

"Yes, well, one has to learn to take losses graciously," he said. "But I can't help but think that our country made a mistake during the last presidential election. Nothing against Jack, of course, but I just don't think he was the...right fit for the job, understand? I think, if he were to be allowed in office for much longer, our progress against the Soviets might come to a halt, and we wouldn't want that."

"Sure wouldn't," said Eddie.

"Have you spend much time with Jack?"

"Not really," he said with a shrug. "He's not as big on the whole hero thing as you and Ike were. Don't really let me do much outside of New York, really."

"I see. And you're...unhappy with that?" Dick was acting casual, but Eddie knew that he was playing at something bigger.

"Hard to say for sure. But I would definitely be a hell of a lot happier if I got to travel a little more."

"Ah. You served in the war, correct?" When Eddie nodded, he continued with, "So, I'm assuming you'd enjoy going overseas some more. Well, I don't think Jack would be comfortable with something like that, but don't ask me why. If I were the one in office, I'd allow you to help with international problems."

"That right? Well, s'a shame ya didn't get that chance, huh, Dick?"

"That's just the thing, Eddie. I think there are...opportunities that might be coming up in the future. Of course, I would need a lot of help to make sure those chances actually came to pass, you understand." Dick's voice had dropped to a conspiratory whisper, the true intent of his invitation revealed.

"And exactly what kinda help d'ya need?"

~X~

Eddie didn't spend much time in California whenever he visited to discuss things with Dick over the next year. He was no stranger to the hippie movement; the teenagers, with their eyesore clothes and bullshit speeches about peace and love. If there was one thing he had learned in his life, it was that nothing solved a problem quicker than a good fight, and anyone who didn't realize that was spoiled.

He knew all about him and had seen enough in his time, but it was worse on the west coast, and he wanted to get away from that as soon as possible. Even the short trip from Dick's home to his hotel was filled with the annoyances, and he kept his head down so he didn't have to look at any of the ugly brats for too long.

It was while he was walking with his head down that something on the ground caught his eye and he bent down to pick it up. It was a button, yellow, with a simple smiley face on it. Not as popular as the rest of the trends they had adopted, but it was certainly one of them, and one that Eddie had seen before. Only now did he really take the time to appreciate it, however.

First and foremost, there was the bright color that was so reminiscent of his old costume that, for all its tackiness, he did miss sometimes. And then there was the image itself; a simple but plain symbol for happiness, something that laughter was often associated with, and though he had never put much effort into looking, he had wanted something on his costume that fit his name ever since they had told him he had to remove the jester belt back in the forties.

What better symbol for a comedian than one so overtly cheerful like that? And knowing that it would piss off the peacemongers only sweetened the deal, so he held on to the button and continued back to his hotel. When he was back in his room, he got out his costume, brought along on the off chance he might need it for something, and affixed the button to it, in the exact place one would put a boutonniere on a suit. The yellow stood out against the black, even more than his shoulder pads did, but he thought it was a nice touch, one befitting him perfectly.

~X~

Later that year, it was time for all of Eddie and Dick's plans to come together. Though Eddie was not directly involved, he had been the one to help Dick find the guy for the job, and he would be the one accompanying him to Dallas and sitting with him while they waited for this to be over. He was also the one who had convinced Pat that Dick would be visiting with some mutual friends of theirs during their time away.

The less people who knew they were behind this, the better, and if Pat suspected anything, she had learned well enough not to say anything. No one knew at the time that the former vice president was even in Texas, much less his reasoning for being there, because Eddie was good at helping him cover his tracks.

There were others involved, of course; Republican allies Dick had made throughout his long political career, people who wanted him in office and wanted the benefits they would receive from that. But they were not the ones that Dick confided in when he got nervous about the plan, and they were not the ones with Eddie's experience when it came to sneaking around.

So the group laid low, not making it known to anyone that they were in the area, just waiting for the news to come through the president had been fatally shot.

~X~

Before the end of that year, Hollis Mason released some tell-all autobiography about his experiences crime fighting and life inside the Minutemen. He said plenty of awful things about Eddie, including outing what had happened with Sally in 1940. When the book hit stores, there was a bit of backlash from people claiming that the Comedian should no longer be touted as a hero and that the government was condoning his actions in that situation.

Those who had always criticized him for his brutality were full of 'I told you so's, but even their points did not last long. Whatever excitement had been stirred up by the release of the book was soon forgotten. In a world where a president could be murdered as Kennedy had, in a world where everyone lived in fear of nuclear war, few thought it worth their time to question the less savory acts of one war hero.


	18. Chapter 18

Between Dr. Manhattan and Ozymandias and the new Nite Owl running around, Eddie was hardly involved in actual super hero work anymore. With those two doing the generic crime fighting, he was put to work almost exclusively on serious cases. His work was still kept mostly local, but there were times he would travel to help out with difficult cases around the country.

But he was still not sent overseas, even as situations arose in other countries. Kennedy's vice president had taken office after his unfortunate passing, and he was no more fond of allowing the Comedian to be involved in political situations. He would be running for president in the coming election, but Nixon had told Eddie he was going to wait a term before making his political return, just to be on the safe side.

So Eddie was off doing real work while Dr. Manhattan fought crime for show and Ozymandias and Nite Owl tried to take on the few remaining grand heists of the few remaining villains, and it seemed that all was taken care of. However, that did not stop yet another hero from surfacing, a weird kid with a weirder mask who called himself Rorschach.

He was known for appearing when least expected and taking down any sort of criminal, regardless of their affiliation. He was brutal, which Eddie admired, but the admiration did not go far. The fact remained that he was still just another brat in a costume, trying his hand at an obsolete profession in a world that couldn't be saved. At least Eddie had the excuse of needing to pay the bills.

Of course, he had already faced facts that he was obsolete. It was evident in the way the world was changing, in the way that even a powerhouse like him could not keep crime at bay, in the way that a man who was practically a god could exist, that none of them were needed anymore. And he knew that it went a little bit further than just paying bills; he knew that it was the only lifestyle he knew and the only one that worked for him. The fact that he hated it as much as he needed it was one of the better jokes that had been played on him over his life.

To add insult to injury, 1965 brought another hero into the spotlight and, like the new Nite Owl, it was another hero bearing the name of a former member of the Minutemen. She was the new Silk Spectre, and one look at her picture in the newspaper confirmed his suspicions: it was his own daughter, Sally's daughter, taking on her mother's image and all that came with it.

So little Laurie, who could only be fifteen, was out in a skimpy yellow costume, and the only difference between it and her mother's was that it conformed more to current trends. Always looking for the best way to gain appeal, that was Sally. He wondered how much of Laurie's work was her own and how much was her mother's. For all he knew, this was her personal dream, but there was just something about the similarities in costume, the use of the same name, that made him wonder.

Whatever the case, a fifteen year old girl who happened to also be his daughter that he didn't know was broadcasting the fact that she would be protecting the streets of New York. He had gotten his start at the same age, but things were different back then; that had been a world where men would allow Sally to take them into custody by virtue of her being a pretty girl. The streets were not so forgiving now, and he didn't know how she would hold up on her own.

He was no longer required to patrol Manhattan at any time, but he soon found himself falling back into that old routine whenever he had a free night. If Laurie was out there, he wanted to at least make sure she was safe. And if he got the chance to meet her, well, that wouldn't be too bad either.

But he didn't seem to be too lucky in that department, as he continuously failed to run into her. Every now and then, she would make a headline, stopping a robbery or something to that extent, but he never even saw a hint of any of that happening. He tried shaking up his patrol routes, but even that did not help.

However, he did run into some other crime fighters on his one of his nights on the streets. Hearing some commotion, he followed the sound to find none other than Rorschach and Nite Owl, finishing up a fight with some thugs. He had heard that the two were working together more and more often now, and he supposed that this confirmed the rumors.

He strode up to them, not bothering to mask his presence. "You boys need any help with that?"

They whirled around to face him, both on guard, but Nite Owl's stance slacked when he realized who he was facing. "You're the Comedian," he said, a hint of awe in his face that surprised Eddie. He would have assumed that any apprentice of Hollis' would have hated him just as much, but the boy seemed to have the good sense to revere an American hero.

The splotches on Rorschach's mask shifted imperceptibly, and Eddie wondered if there were a meaning to the movements; if, perhaps, there were facial expressions to be read in there, some way to translate the appearance of the mask into what the strange young man were feeling. Whatever the case, he said nothing.

"The one and only," Eddie replied. "But it looks like you two got this one covered."

"Yeah, you just missed the action," Nite Owl said. "I've...heard a lot about you."

"I'm sure ya have, kid," he said. "Bein' famous'll do that to a man's reputation. But don't let whatever ol' Hollis has to say color your opinion too much." He winked and started to head back the way he came.

~X~

The invitation from Nelson Gardner in 1966 came as a surprise to him. First of all, because he never would have expected anything from Nelson, after the encounters they had shared, and second of all, because of how stupid the invitation was in the first place. It loudly proclaimed to be for the first ever meeting of a new crime fighting group, with a name that caught Eddie between a cringe and a laugh.

He had absolutely zero interest in attending this Crimebusters meeting, for multiple reasons. After all, the Minutemen had not gone well for him, and he had done much better out of a group setting. Not to mention the fact that there was hardly any work to be done in terms of the super hero bullshit. The amount of active villains was laughable; there were a few predictable, forgettable ones who would pop up and be taken down quickly, and there was Moloch, who was back in prison not long after an escape and who Dr. Manhattan targeted so often that Eddie didn't even bother with him anymore, despite having enjoyed how constant he was in the past.

None of whoever Nelson had invited was really needed, and they certainly wouldn't be needed in a large group. Eddie least of all, considering he had much more important work to do, but his handlers were the ones who passed the invitation on to him, and he was told to 'seriously consider it', which meant that he was probably going to be made to go, to continue to perpetrate the hero image that disguised the fact that he was really nothing more than an agent with some tacky shoulder pads.

But then he wondered who all Nelson had invited, and he wondered if his daughter was going to be present. It only made sense; if he would reach so far as to invite the Comedian, a man he had not had many good experiences with, of course he would invite the daughter of Sally Jupiter, his co-founder in the Minutemen. And if what he suspected were true, Sally would jump at the chance to get Laurie involved with something like that, so it stood to reason that the new Silk Spectre would be there.

In fact, Sally might even be there, and while that should have been reason for him to stay away- he knew better than to try to get involved with her again at this point- it only made him want to go more. He would get the chance to see his daughter in person, even if it was from a distance, and he would get to see Sally, and she wouldn't risk causing a scene in public over her biggest secret. It wasn't something he was proud of, but he still caught himself missing her.

So with that in mind, he surprised his handlers by announcing he was going to go, rather than waiting for an order from them, and, on the night of the meeting, he got into costume and headed out to a familiar address. It was not the first time he had been to Nelson's mansion, but it would be the first time he had been able to enter without having to break in first.

He had never seen Nelson's library before, but it was so painfully obvious that he had set it up with intention of having the perfect super hero meeting room that Eddie laughed to himself as he entered the room. Nelson offered him a weak smile, not quite looking like he regretted inviting him, but close. The only other people present were Ozymandias, who didn't make eye contact, and Dr. Manhattan and his girlfriend.

Just to spite him, Eddie took a chair close to Ozymandias, but with his back to the young man, leaning back in his chair and resting his feet on a nearby counter. There was a newspaper and he picked it up, skimming through it as he lit a cigar. Not long after that, Nite Owl and Rorschach came in together, and a few moments later, he heard the click of high heels as Laurie entered the room.

It was hard to not drop the paper completely and openly stare, but he was good at pretending to read while checking out potential suspects, and knew to treat this the same way. But there she stood, sixteen now, with her mother's eyes but long, dark hair that matched Eddie's in both color and texture. She was just as beautiful as she had looked in the papers, and she walked with an artificial confidence that mimicked Sally's, but her face gave away the fact that she was nervous.

She didn't even look at Eddie when she passed him; her eyes stayed on Dr. Manhattan as she crossed the room and sat down near him. He looked back at her, and she smiled at him, and his girlfriend glared, and Eddie got a very bad feeling that only increased when he noticed the way Nite Owl was looking at her. Of course her beauty would be noticed and of course he would have to watch as Hollis Mason's successor and the freakiest man in the universe eyeballed his daughter.

When everyone was settled in, Nelson cleared his throat and said, "Well, firstly let me say I'm pleased to see so many of you here, very pleased. Secondly, for those who only know me as Captain Metropolis, the name's Nelson Gardner. Call me Nelson. Third, uh, I guess I should welcome everyone to the first ever meeting of the Crimebusters!"

He took a moment to survey the room, but did not receive whatever reaction he was looking for and continued. "Why 'the Crimebusters'? Well, as you know, this country hasn't had an organization of masked adventurers since the Minutemen disbanded in forty-nine. Specialized law enforcement is standing still. Crime isn't." Eddie rolled his eyes, even though nobody could see that reaction. Who was this idiot kidding? There was only so much a bunch of men playing dress up could do, and the sort of work they could do? Useless when one considered just how fucked up the world was becoming.

But Nelson wasn't done. "New social evils emerge every day. Promiscuity, drugs, campus subversion, you name it!" Seriously? That was what he considered the big threats they had to face? As if stopping a few drug lords or busting some hookers or beating the shit out of some bratty university student meant anything in the face of nuclear war. And everyone else was just listening along like they agreed! "Now, by banding together as the Crimebusters, we-"

"Bullshit," Eddie muttered, finally unable to keep quiet. It was just too much for him, how all these kids were acting like they knew how the world worked, how Nelson refused to move past the forties, how fucking Dr. Manhattan just stood there and pretended not to know just how much the world had gone to hell.

"What?" Nelson turned to him, already looking afraid. He probably thought Eddie was going to take this opportunity to out him or something, claiming that he should know all about social evils or whatever. And the idea crossed his mind; it would be damn hilarious to expose the man for what he was in front of a group like this, but Eddie wanted them all to know exactly what he knew.

"I said bullshit," he repeated. "This whole idea, this Crimebusters shtick, it stinks. What it is, Nelly, is that you're gettin' old and you wanna go on playin' cowboys and Indians."

The hurt on Nelson's face would have made him laugh if he weren't so irritated. "Th-that isn't true..."

"Uh, listen," said Nite Owl, sounding as if he were trying to play mediator, "let's not throw the idea out right away. Me and Rorschach have made headway into the gang problem by pooling our efforts..."

"Obviously I agree," said Rorschach, chiming in, and it was the first time Eddie had heard the kid's voice. It was unsettling; quiet and raspy, and just a little bit muffled by the fabric of his mask. "But a group this size seems more like a publicity stunt. It's too big and unwieldy."

"Surely that's just an organizational problem," spoke up Ozymandias, in the pompous, know-it-all way he always spoke, and Eddie put down the newspaper at last, rising from his chair. "With the right person coordinating the group, I think-"

"Oh, an' I wonder who _that_ would be?" Eddie stood in front of him now, glaring down at the blonde man. "Got any ideas, Ozzy? I mean, you _are_ the smartest guy in the world, right?" He had read in some article a while back that that was what people were calling the young hero now, but he spat it out like it were an insult.

"It doesn't require genius to see that the America has problems that need tackling," he argued.

"Damn straight," Eddie replied, "an' it takes a moron to think they're small enough for clowns like you guys to handle. Believe me."

"I think I'm as well-informed as anyone," he said icily. "Given the correct handling, one of the world's problems are insurmountable. All it takes is a little _intelligence_."

If there was one thing Eddie hated more than a clueless idiot, it was a clueless idealist, and it was obvious that the emphasis on his last word was meant to be a dig at him. "Which you got in _spades_ , right?" He shook his head, laughing bitterly and without smiling. "You people are a joke. You hear Moloch's back in town and think, 'oh, boy! Let's gang up and bust him!' You think that _matters_? You think that _solves_ anything?"

He stalked across the room to a map Nelson had hung up, tacking on slips of paper with various types of crime written on them. Whatever the hell it was supposed to mean hadn't made sense; they were all local to New York with the exception of Dr. Manhattan, and it wasn't as if those crimes were only in certain locations. It had been a stupid display to begin with.

"It don't matter squat. Here, lemme show ya _why_ it don't matter," he grumbled, pulling out his lighter. He heard Nelson protest behind him as he lit the bottom of the map on fire. "It don't matter squat because inside thirty years, the nukes are gonna be flyin' like maybugs."

He turned away from the map as it burned and Nelson protested again, and he started for the door. "And then Ozzy here is gonna be the smartest man on the cinder. Now pardon me, but I got an appointment." He did not look back as he strode out of the room, calling, "See you in the funny papers!"

Once Eddie was outside, he realized that he had not paid a bit of attention to Laurie after Nelson had started speaking and he cursed. The whole point of going was to get to see her, but he had gotten so angry that he had completely forgotten. Of course, there was no way the meeting could last after the scene he had caused, and he decided to wait outside and maybe catch her before she left.

Hanging off, just a little bit out of sight, he put out his cigar against a tree and lit up another one, leaning back against the tree. He saw Nite Owl take off in that weird little ship of his and Rorschach disappearing into the foliage, and then he saw Laurie, walking down the pathway in front of the mansion.

"Laurel?" he called out. "Laurel Jane? Is that right?" She turned, and he saw the same flicker of nerves in her face that he had seen when she first entered the meeting. "So, you're Sally's kid?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah," she said, smiling at him as he approached her. "You're the Comedian. I caught your act in there. You were pretty cool." She lowered her lashes and he felt a pit in his stomach, but he was so close to her now that he could not stop himself from getting even closer. He had missed out on sixteen years and he was desperate to claim even a little bit of that time.

"Well, you don't look like you grew up too bad yourself," he said, stopping when he stood directly in front of here. "Here...lemme take a look..." He lifted her chin with his hand, aware that this action would appear intimate to her, aware that a girl raised to be another Sally would approach this situation in a way that he did not want to be approached by his daughter, but he had to get a closer look at her.

"Heh, yeah, there's her eyes...even got that funny little mole..." His heart swelled with a fondness that he had not felt in a very long time, and even then, it was different than what he had felt before. This was his daughter, and he could see Sally in her, but he could also see so much of himself. "You ain't got her hair, but otherwise, you're like her. You're a looker."

"Well, uh, thank you." He let go of her face then, and she looked up at him from under her lashes, bashful yet inviting. It would be irresistible to any other man. She reached into her purse, producing a cigarette. "Uh, say, I need a cigarette, but I don't have a light. Do you...?"

He wondered if he should say no, give her some lecture about how smoking was bad for her, but he wasn't supposed to be her father, and he didn't think he would be very good at that part of parenting even if he was, so he went along with it. "Sure. Hey, listen, your mom, she talk about me much?"

"No, not much," she said innocently, and he knew that she did not even slightly suspect the nature of his relationship with Sally.

"Heh, it figures," he replied, not giving anything away in his tone. He pulled out his lighter, saying, "Here's you light." She leaned into it, and he started, "I..." but her the tip of her cigarette dulled. "Hell, gone out. Here, lemme..."

Laurie grabbed his hand then, saying, "It's okay, I'll steady it. There, that's better." Once again, the intimacy of the situation felt wrong to him, but he did not have the chance to say anything or pull back or try to correct it before they were interrupted.

"You take your hands off her!" Sally shouted, and the two turned to face her, Laurie looking mortified.

Eddie, to his credit, tried to remain casual, even though he was now faced with the mother of the girl he was not supposed to see, the only woman he could ever say he had truly cared about. "Hi, Sal. Long time no see."

"Not long enough in my book, Eddie," she snarled. "Laurel Jane, you put that thing out and come here immediately. We're going home." Laurie walked to her mother's side sheepishly while Sally turned the brunt of her wrath back to Eddie. "And as for you, are there no depths you won't sink to?"

He realized how it must have looked, but the accusation still stung. "Christ, we were just _talking_. Can't a guy talk to his..." He paused, catching himself. "Ya know, how old friend's daughter? I mean, what do you think I _am_?"

"I _know_ what you are, Edward Blake," she said venomously. "I've known what you were for twenty-five years, and don't you ever forget that. Get in the car, Laurie."

"Sally, listen," he said, not understanding why she was so angry at him after their last conversation had made a sort of peace between them. "Listen, I thought we'd settled that a long time ago."

"No. Things like that don't ever get settled, not completely, and they're not going to happen to my _daughter._ Goodbye, Eddie." And with that, she climbed in the car and sped off, and he could only watch and the two of them drove away.

Sally had been wearing a pair of pearl earrings.


	19. Chapter 19

Well, that was it then. That was the end of things as far as he was concerned. That was the last time he would allow himself near Sally, and that was the last time he was going to give a damn what she thought of him. After having her set him up and knock him down so many times, he had to learn his lesson eventually, and this time, he had learned it.

They had worked things out, for Christ's sake! When he had called her, she hadn't been upset with him and things had been fine, but now, the first time she had seen him since the end of their affair, she yelled at him and _accused him of trying to rape his own daughter_.

There was nothing that could erase the meaning of her final statement from his mind, and he felt sick just thinking about it. Had she honestly believed that was his intention? Yes, it was true that to an onlooker, the interaction between him and Laurie would appear intimate. He knew that, but she knew better. She knew damn well who Laurie was to him, and she knew that he was sorry about what had happened in the Minutemen, but she threw in back in his face in the worst way possible.

So he was done with her. He was fed up with the way she had been impossible to please, with the way she had refused him any sort of access to his own child, with the way she never allowed him to move past his mistakes. Maybe he had made a lot of them, but he had also apologized for them, and he did not apologize often. Why had she never realized that?

If he saw Laurie again, she would not be as open to him, knowing how much her mother hated him; for all he knew, Sally was telling her just how awful of a person he was right now. He would never have a chance to even become her friend, and even so, he wouldn't want to go near her lest he run into Sally again.

He had loved her, but she had hurt him for the last time, and it was with that thought in mind that he headed for the first bar that he could find, not bothering to head home and change out of his costume first. Let the patrons stare, let them feel nervous that they were sharing space with the Comedian. All he cared about was getting drunk enough to not give a shit anymore.

But then he noticed the eyes on him. At first, he didn't pay it much mind- plenty of people recognized him, so plenty of people would stare, but the young woman was so shamelessly open about it that eventually he had to look back, and then he noticed there was more to her stare than idle curiosity.

She looked him up and down, intrigued by a bit more than his identity, and when she realized he was looking back at her, she smirked before looking away. He moved to sit down beside her and said, "Ya know, you didn't have to be so damn obvious. If ya wanted to talk to me, ya coulda just come over."

"Well, I wasn't sure you would want to talk to me," she replied with a coquettish grin, and he had to laugh at that.

"Are you sure now?" he asked, and she nodded. "I'm guessin' you already know who I am, but what's your name, baby?"

~X~

Her name was Zoey, and she didn't live very far from there, and it was not long into their conversation before she made that fact known. He had figured that he would at least have to buy her a drink before she invited him, but it didn't take that much. She was eager, and she was young- he did not want to try to guess her age- and she did not waste any time.

When it came time for him to leave in the morning, he had almost forgotten why he had been upset in the first place, so when she asked him if they would see each other again, he decided to be a good sport and ask for her number, even though he had no intention to call her again. He had slept in his mask because he had fucked her in it, and he had fucked her in it because she already knew him as the Comedian and he didn't need to complicate things by bringing Eddie Blake into this.

It had been one of the better nights, in terms of casual sex, and he wondered if it had something to do with the fact that he wasn't comparing the girl to anyone else this time, so she was far less likely to disappoint him. She didn't even have red hair, for once; Zoey was a brunette.

~X~

But then it hit the news that Dr. Manhattan had a new girlfriend, and Eddie wouldn't have cared about the celebrity gossip except for the fact that he knew who it was before the papers even confirmed it. Of course that freak had left that other chick (paper said her name was Janey Slater) for a sixteen-year-old who had probably been taught all of her tricks by her own mother.

It made him nauseous, imagining how it must have happened, knowing someone like _that_ was with his daughter. Someone who was so much older than her but someone who was so inhuman that age did not matter. And god only knew what the side effects to fucking someone like him would be, but Eddie really didn't want that sort of image in his mind.

He didn't want to think about any of it anymore than he had wanted to think about his situation after the bullshit meeting and so, against his better judgment, he fished out Zoey's number and gave her a call. If she could make him forget things once, maybe she could again, and he tried really hard not to think about the fact that she had dark hair and was almost young enough.

And when she answered, all he had to do was say, "It's me," and she knew what was coming, and she asked him if he remembered where she lived. He did, because he rarely forgot details like that so quickly, and he was there within the hour, where she waited for him, already undressed.

It was annoying to have to get into costume for a quick fuck, but then it wasn't a quick fuck- it turned out, she could go for however long he wanted her to, and he had a lot of frustrations to work out. He hated to admit it, but when he made his way home the next morning, he had a feeling that he would be calling on her again.

~X~

That was how things went for him for a while; fucking Zoey whenever he wasn't working and the mood struck him, ignoring anything he heard about Laurie and Dr. Manhattan, and just trying to get on with things. He found out that she had only been nineteen at the time of their first encounter, but that was a hell of a lot better than sixteen, so he let it slide.

In '68, Nixon won the election, and Eddie received an invitation to some fancy celebration party in Washington. He was told he could bring a guest, but Dick expected him to wear a suit to the party and Zoey had not once seen him out of costume in the two years they had been fucking, and he didn't want her to get the wrong idea about them anyway, so he went alone and fucked some senator's wife.

"I'm gonna be goin' to Washington a lot more now," he told Zoey once he was back. "I mean, pretty damn often now that Nixon's in office."

"That's fine," she said, shrugging. "We don't exactly have a set schedule for when you show up unannounced and fuck my brains out." He had stopped calling ahead of time once he had figured out that she really did live alone and that she really was single. If he was in the mood, he just went on over, and if she wasn't home, he'd go find somebody else, but if she was home, she knew exactly what he needed.

"I'm just sayin' I might be by even less," he replied. He knew she was lying about being okay with it, but he didn't care as much about that as he did making sure that she knew what was happening and couldn't complain later. "I don't wanna hear ya bitchin' about how ya never see me or whatever, I've got more work now."

"I already told you it's fine," she repeated, and he was glad that she at least thought she was good at lying.

~X~

Sometime in the next year, for whatever reason, Dr. Manhattan decided it was a good idea to reveal his true identity to the public. Eddie didn't really think he had any other identity, not anymore, but if he wanted the world to know that he had once been Jon Osterman, then that was his choice, he guessed.

He wondered if Laurie had known his name all along, then figured she must have, if they were still so hot and heavy. She was about to turn twenty now, but he still couldn't bear to think about what was going on between them, and he was in Washington when the news about Manhattan's identity broke, so calling on Zoey was out of the question for now.

Tricia Nixon, on the other hand, was visiting her parents, and she was young and beautiful and had always acted just a little bit interested in the Comedian. He had his qualms about fucking a friend's wife, but a friend's daughter seemed fair game when he considered just how his daughter had been taken form him.

~X~

He was barely back in New York from one of his longer stints in Washington when he got a call from one of his handlers, saying that things had gone from bad to worse in Vietnam. There had been a hell of a lot of tension there for a while, and when war broke out, it was no surprise to anyone. It was also no secret, at least not to those Eddie knew, that it was nothing more then a small piece in the greater struggle between the US and the Soviets, and had little to do with any actual interest in the country or the lives of the Vietnamese.

And Dick had promised him that, should things get worse, he would be sent to help take care of things. After all, he was an old war hero, and he had made it clear that he would have liked another war under his belt to further cement that image. He hadn't seen any real action since the forties and, if anything, shots of him running around the jungle and taking out a few enemies would make for good propaganda.

The night before he left, he broke the news to Zoey and spent the night fucking her. As he was about to go, she muttered, "Make sure you come back, alright?" He pretended not to hear her.


	20. Chapter 20

The war in Vietnam was not so much a war as it was a shitshow, and Eddie was sure that was the only word to properly describe the situation, at least as he saw it. Things were in bad shape when he arrived, and he was immediately put in a group of soldiers who answered directly to him. He had no rank, but they were desperate for anything to help them, and the morale boost that came from an outdated war hero seemed just the thing.

But his methods were not anywhere near ineffective, and he demonstrated and encouraged a brutality that his soldiers were all too willing to pick up. Soon enough, things were looking up, which was good because he knew what would happen if this war was not wrapped up quickly.

Dick had made it no secret that he was interested in drafting Dr. Manhattan, claiming that there would be no better weapon to unleash. Of course, Eddie agreed, but that was why he didn't want him involved- that level of intimidation would only increase the tension even more when the war was over. That, and the fact that he just plain didn't like the guy for personal reasons, and would rather take care of things on his own. He had been trying to get back to war for years; he didn't need the show stolen by his daughter's freaky blue boyfriend.

Downtime was spent at some dive bar that his soldiers had grown to like since he arrived and their missions became localized. Eddie would sit with the young men who stared at him with an awe that they must have developed growing up on stories about him, and he would pretend to fit in with them, even though he really didn't fit in anywhere. They would ask him questions, because everyone asked him questions, and he would tell them jokes, because that's what a Comedian did.

"Say, you got a girl back home?" one of the young men asked him, because they had been teasing someone about a photograph they had of a girl who seemed much too beautiful to be his. Eddie's mind flashed to Sally, who he quickly tried to replace with images of Zoey. Hell, even Tricia Nixon was preferable to Sally.

"Who, him?" another soldier replied. "He's a hero, I betcha he's got a girl in every state, at the very least!"

Eddie chuckled and shook his head. "Nah, ain't got one in every state, though I do have just about as many in the city." Which was bullshit, or maybe it wasn't; he wasn't sure if the girls he fucked once during his four year stint fucking Zoey counted, or if it had to be a regular thing.

"See, I told you!" the soldier said with a grin, and then they were pressing him for stories, and those were details he had in spades. He told them some of his raunchier tales, and if his better stories happened to involve Zoey, and if his best stories happened to involve Sally, it didn't matter, because he left names out.

But one night, while he was sharing his stories and jokes and the young men listened and laughed begged for more details, he noticed the way the young woman hung in the doorway, watching them and giggling to herself. She was Vietnamese, and maybe a prostitute; he wasn't sure how that worked here, but he had heard stories.

For a few nights after, she continued to hang back and watch them, but she never approached the table or tried to solicit herself, so maybe she wasn't a prostitute. Either way, he had no intention of paying her when he walked up to her one night and said, "Ya know, a picture might last longer."

She was confused, of course. She didn't understand the joke, because her English was limited, but she offered a polite smile and said, "I know you."

"That so? Cos I'm a big hero, right?"

She nodded, her smile growing. "Yes, a hero."

Their conversation was mostly one sided, but he managed to learn that her name was Anh, and even if she did not understand some of what he said, she understood when he was joking and she understood when to laugh. And when she laughed, her whole face lit up and for a split second, it didn't matter that she had black hair or brown eyes or that she was Vietnamese, there was something in her face that reminded him so much of Sally he ached.

But he wasn't thinking about Sally anymore, and he certainly wasn't aching for her anymore, so he tried to ignore the resemblance- which didn't make any sense in the first place- that came whenever she laughed. He never stopped trying to make her laugh, though, and he was more than eager to take her to bed every night that he could. Taking advantage of the hospitality of the women was a comfort that many men at war took, after all.

~X~

Months went by, with every day feeling identical to the one before. It grew ever more apparent just how pointless of a war this was, how miserable the entire situation was, but Eddie couldn't say that he cared. He hated the heat, and missed some of the comforts of home, but there was something to being able to be just as brutal as he wanted with no consequence. He did not have to hold back at all, and it felt like a breath of fresh air to be able to burn a village to the ground just because he could.

Long gone were the days of needing violence to steady his temper; he had gained control over himself a long time ago. It was not that he needed to do this to ensure he was keeping himself in balance and not hurting the wrong people, it was that he needed to do this because he missed it. None of it mattered either way, who won or lost the war, how many people died because of him or someone else, what anyone was fighting for, anything.

The world, like any good joke, wouldn't last forever, and as someone who had chosen to be on the outside, the giving end of the joke, he could see that. The best thing for him to do was ride it out, laughing all the while, because he was not just the one telling the joke, he was a reflection of the joke. He was the joke on a smaller scale and he was the mascot and the punchline just as much as he was the Comedian.

Each day was spent following through with that, and each night was spent with Anh, whenever possible. He didn't know why she went along with fucking him so often, but he suspected it had something to do with wanting a passage to America when all of this was over. No way in hell was he going to get saddled with her, but she was good enough company for now.

Since she was of no consequence, he let her see him without his mask and allowed her to call him Eddie (though, for whatever reason, she always tacked a "mister" to the front of it), and some nights he would even hold her for a little bit before he left. But he was careless with her in a way that he hadn't allowed himself to be for a long time, because it had just seemed so impossible for it to happen again, and here, of all places.

He couldn't deny the obvious though, and she might not have said anything about it, but there was a look in her face that told him something was off long before the bump began to develop on her stomach. That was when he finally confronted her, and she burst into tears, begging him to help her with the baby in her broken English.

"When the war's over, we'll deal with it," he lied. "But I need ya to take care of yourself until then, alright? I don't want you comin' around here anymore, or else somethin' bad might happen to ya. Or the baby. I'll come visit you from now on, alright?"

She was so willing and so eager that he did actually visit her a few times, but those times typically ended with her sucking him off, and he still sought company in the arms of a few other desperate women after that. Anh was none the wiser and genuinely believed that he would be there for her.

~X~

He received word that Dr. Manhattan would be intervening in the conflict, and the next day, the man appeared in a flash of light that nearly gave every soldier in the room a heart attack.

Later that evening, Eddie sat in the bar, drinking while a young woman clung to him, and Dr. Manhattan was brought in to be formally introduced to him. They shook hands and Eddie felt a weird surge of electricity that was not exactly unpleasant when they touched. He was so casual with Dr. Manhattan that the others in the room looked nervous for him, as if they thought he would be struck down for smiling and cracking jokes like he was talking to just anyone.

He did a damn good job pretending that he wasn't thinking about how that weird surge of electricity must feel to Laurie, or that he wasn't wishing there was some way to kill the man both for stealing the show from him and fucking his daughter.


	21. Chapter 21

It did not take long after Dr. Manhattan's arrival for the conflict to end. The war had been won, but Eddie had a hard time giving a shit, all things considered. He'd been fighting there for nearly a year, and now it was all over, and damned if he got any of the credit for it. Damned if anything he'd done here had even mattered.

And what was worse, Dr. Manhattan seemed to consider him a friend just because Eddie didn't act intimidated like the other soldiers and wasn't afraid to go near him. It was almost comical, the way the young men would suddenly remember somewhere else to be and clear out whenever he was present, leaving only Eddie to try to make conversation.

That was where he found himself on his last night in Vietnam. Everyone was celebrating in some way, but all Eddie could think about was the fact that he would soon be back home and done with all this bullshit. Even war had lost its appeal to him, and he wondered if there was really much else for him.

"Goddamn fireworks," he grumbled, hearing a few loud bursts from outside. "You think this country'd had enough goddamn fireworks!"

"I suppose V.V.N. night must mean something to them," Manhattan observed.

"Nah, most average Vietnamese don't give a damn who won," replied Eddie, pouring himself a shot. "It means something to the dinks, an' it means plenty to us. I mean, if we'd lost this war...I dunno. I think it might have driven us a little crazy, ya know? As a country." He scoffed. "But, thanks to you, we didn't, right? Downa hatch." He downed the shot.

"You sound bitter," Manhattan said, sounding as close to amused as he could. "You're a strange man, Blake. You have a strange attitudes to life and war."

"Strange?" he asked with a laugh. It figured the glowing, half-naked blue man would be the one to give him a talk on what was strange. The two walked out to the porch of the bar as he continued. "Listen...once you figure out what a joke everything is, being the Comedian's the only thing makes sense."

"The charred villages, the boys with necklaces of human ears...these are part of the joke?" His tone was not accusatory, but rather laced with a genuine curiosity.

"Hey, I never said it was a good joke. I'm just playin' along with the gag." He would have said more, but he noticed a commotion around a helicopter that had recently touched down. None other than Dick Nixon emerged from it, much to the joy of the crowd.

"Ha! Lookithat!" He shook his head in amusement. "There he is. First press helicopter into Saigon since the ceasefire. He's got the next election in the bag for sure. Me, I'm takin' the first chopper _out_!"

"You're anxious to leave?" Once again, Dr. Manhattan spoke with curiosity.

"Doc, are you _kidding_? I hate this place. I hate the temperature, I hate the smell, I hate this rotten, cheap bourbon." He sneered. "First chopper out, man, I'm gone." He turned to head back inside, and Manhattan started to follow him, when they heard a voice from behind.

"Mister Eddie?" Anh, now very visibly pregnant, followed him inside as he tried to ignore her.

"Oh, great," he muttered to himself. "Oh, thank you, God, that's just what I needed..."

"Now, war is over, Mister Eddie. Now, I must talk with you," she said, remembering his promise that he had never had any intention of keeping. He had hoped she would follow instructions and continue to stay away from him even after the ceasefire so that he could slip away undetected, but luck had clearly not been on his side.

"Listen, we got nothin' to talk about. I'm leavin'. Saigon number ten, New York number one, okay?" He wouldn't even face her.

"You...walk away...from _this_?" She sounded hurt, and she sounded angry, but she did not sound surprised.

"Sure."

"But me, _I_ cannot walk from what grows in my belly. I cannot forget!" she protested.

"Well, that's unfortunate, because that's just what _I'm_ gonna do," he said with a shrug. "Forget you, forget your cruddy little country, all of it." Knowing her, his harsh words would drive her away, leading her to storm out in a huff, and then he would in the clear once again.

"I do not think so. I think you remember me and my country," she said. "I think you remember us as long as you live." He snickered and started to think of what to say to her next, when he heard the sound of glass breaking and turned.

"Huh? What's-" Before he could finish the question, he saw the broken bottle in her hand, and before he could make a move to stop her, she raised her arm and brought in back down, slashing a jagged edge of glass down the side of his face. The pain was sharp and nearly brought him to his knees, and he touched the wound, warm blood on his fingers.

"My _face_!" he snarled, before groaning in pain. Hot anger surged through him as he stared Anh down, who looked terrified of what she had just done. "What did you do, you _bitch_ , you hurt my face, you whore, you..." His hand went to the gun at his side. "...filthy, stinking, worthless..."

He drew it, and Manhattan raised a hand. "Blake?"

"...lousy piece of..." He pointed the gun at Anh, who had tears streaming down her face and who was too afraid to even move. His head cleared for a moment then, his anger no longer controlling him like it once would have, and he had that moment to think, to reconsider.

But the woman standing in front of him was not Sally, even if they shared a laugh, and a life with her would not make up for the life he had missed out on, and the baby she carried was not Laurie, and would never be Laurie, and he hated them both so much that he couldn't stand it.

Dr. Manhattan realized that he was not going to back down, saying, "Blake, don't-" But he pulled the trigger before he could finish the sentence with a monotonous, "-do it." His tone had been just as devoid of emotion as anything else he said; not very convincing for someone trying to stop a murder. It only made Eddie all the more glad that he had done it, and now Anh lay on the floor dead, bleeding from her chest.

He turned away like it was nothing, holding his face. "Medic. Gotta find the goddamn medic." He winced, the pain not subsiding at all. She had cut deep, and he wasn't sure how long it would take to recover. "Ow...that _bitch_."

"Blake, she was pregnant," said Manhattan, stopping him, and this time, his tone was just slightly accusatory. "You gunned her down."

"Yeah," he replied, his anger returning. After all they had seen, all they had done, all that Dr. Manhattan himself had done, he was going to play the high-and-mighty act now? "Yeah, that's right. Pregnant woman. Gunned her down. Bang. And ya know what? You _watched_ me."

He shook his head, laughing. "You coulda changed the gun into steam or the bullets into mercury, or the bottle into snowflakes! You coulda teleported either of us to goddamn Australia, but you didn't lift finger!"

Eddie stalked out of the bar. "You don't really give a damn about human beings. I've watched you. You never cared about whatshername, Janey Slater, even _before_ you ditched her. Soon, you won't be interested in Sally Jupiter's little gal, either." And that final dig was the only one he could afford without giving away too much information, but it was true that it was another fear that he had for Laurie.

"You're driftin' out touch, Doc," he said as he began to make his way to the nearest medical tent. "You're turnin' into a flake. God help us all." He shook his head, not needing to look back to see that Manhattan was not following him.

~X~

The cut was deep and the crude treatments he had wouldn't do much for it. He was told that it would definitely leave a scar, and when he took a look at himself in the mirror, he saw that the gash extended from just below his eye to the corner of his mouth. It gave him the appearance of perpetually sneering, which wouldn't be a bad expression to have, but the gash was unbearably ugly.

He should have seen her attack coming sooner, he should have been able to stop her, she shouldn't have attacked him in the first place. Anh had never been particularly aggressive and there was no reason for her not to act as he had assumed she would. If she had just had the good sense to leave him _alone_ , she wouldn't be dead in some shitty bar and he'd still have the same face.

By the time he made it back to the United States, he was able to remove the bandages and see that it was still there, a permanent part of his appearance now. But he tried to push that out of his mind, not wanting to spoil his return too much. It had been a year since he had been in New York, and he felt that he owed someone a visit.

He hadn't bothered to write to Zoey or anything stupid like that while he was away, so he had no idea what her life was like now. It took minimal digging to figure out that she still lived in the same place, but he didn't know if she was seeing anyone now or if she was even still pretty. Either way, he still made his way to her home, costume and all, and knocked on the door.

Her eyes widened when she saw it was him; she didn't look much different at all, which was a relief, at least. "It's...it's you," she said, and then broke into a smile. "You're already back!"

"Sure I am," he replied, letting himself in. "War's over, baby."

"I know, but I just wasn't sure when you would be back..." She looked away, and he realized that she sounded close to tears. He had to hold back a groan. Was she really going to give him this sentimental shit tonight?

But she steeled herself and looked up at him with a grin. "So, you ready to get down to it?" He needed no further invitation, taking her into a rough and demanding kiss as he lead her to the bedroom. It'd been a long time since he'd done anything with a woman who could really understand what he was saying, one who could talk dirty in fucking English, and her apartment and bedroom were so damn clean.

When they were done, she laid next to him and stared up at him in awe, as if he weren't real, as if he would disappear or something. She reached a hand up, tracing it down his scar and he sighed. He should have known that she would point it out at some point, and he had been hoping to forget about it for a little while.

"What happened here?" she asked softly.

"Just what happens at war," he replied, smirking. "Just ignore it, baby." But after that, when he decided he was ready for a second round, he kept noticing her eyes lingering on it.

It wasn't that the sex was bad; it was great, and it always had been with her, and it was better than anything he'd had over the past year, but between her staring at his scar and her looking up at him with so much affection it nauseated him, and he just wanted out of there. He'd gotten close enough to Anh to know he didn't want to be stuck with anyone or anything, and if Zoey thought herself in love with him, then that would be the end of that.

He fucked her one more time that night, and once in the morning before he left, glad that he was not so old that he had lost his endurance just yet. She was so damn happy in the morning that she didn't even make a remark about seeing him again, as if she were certain that he would be back. He didn't tell her that he would never drop by again, that he would never be her boyfriend or whatever she wanted, that he would never come close to loving her.

Eddie just left, and went home to change into some normal, comfortable civilian clothes for the first time in a long time. Then he went out to buy a new mask, one that would cover his scar.


	22. Chapter 22

Nixon ran for a second term and was elected in 1972, but not long after that, some investigations started involving some sort of break in at the Watergate Hotel. Dick didn't give Eddie details, and to the public, he denied any involvement from him or the Republican party, but it was obvious that there had been sabotage to ensure that he would win the election.

Either way, things were looking bad for him if anything were to come out that might link the ordeal to him, so he asked Eddie to help do an investigation of his own and turn up anyone snooping where they weren't supposed to be. Whatever he did with those he discovered was his call, and the two journalists he discovered were dealt with in the same way he dealt with the majority of his problems.

And while he investigated that by night, by day several publicity stunts were set up with bank robbers ad kidnappers that were really just actors, so that America could be reminded that they had a real-life hero, and that that hero trusted the president above all else. Everyone was so distracted by that that they all but forgot about the would-be scandal, and hardly anyone noticed the two journalists turning up dead.

They had a dinner in his honor, some fancy political party that Dick funded, but was too busy to attend. It was masqueraded as a celebration for all of his accomplishments, but it was really just appreciation for saving Dick's political career. The fact that he couldn't attend meant he still had a few things to clean up on his end, but Eddie didn't really mind his absence much. It was just another night of keeping everyone entertained; what was one less guest?

But there were two more guests than he expected that night, one of which he had not wanted to see and the other who did not look pleased to be there or see him. Dr. Manhattan and Laurie sat across the room from him, the former in conversation while the latter was already drinking heavily. Eddie did his best to ignore her, because he knew the night could not end well if he didn't.

Most of the men there did not have the level of clearance he did, and didn't know anything about the true purpose of the evening, or the extent Eddie had gone to to start up and preserve Dick's political career over the years. Conversing with them was funny; they talked like they knew everything and he played along as if he didn't know more than they did. Some even talked to him like a close friend, even though none of them knew him all that well.

Later on in the night, he was talking with a few other men, joking about things that they didn't understand, when suddenly, one of the men shushed another, who had begun to speak negatively of Dr. Manhattan. The one who had done the shushing then smiled, politely greeting the woman who had just stumbled up to them.

"Miss Juspeczyk. Good to see you."

That was a new one. Eddie hadn't heard her called anything but Laurie Jupiter and had never heard the odd, foreign-sounding surname before. He supposed it could be Polish, and wondered if it was Sally's given name. Deciding it was okay to keep things casual, he allowed his curiosity to come out as he said, "'Juspeczy'? What's that? Grandmother's name? Didn't like Jupiter, huh? Didn't take your old man's name either..." It was a dig at a man that had not been present for a very long time and a dig that she wouldn't begin to understand, but it was a dig that Eddie could not resist.

"What's my name to you?" she asked. She was drunk, that much was plain, but she was also growing angry, and he could see what Sally meant, about the resemblance in that regard. Once again, he was overtaken by the urge to really see his daughter, and he once again did not care about consequences as he took her chin in his hand.

"Nothing. Ya know, you're a pretty girl. I just gotta look at you, I see your mom." He chuckled, because that was both true and not true. There was so much of Sally there, but there was so much of himself too, and that was what he was looking for now. "Ya know, your mother, she was a peach..."

"Is that what you told her before you tried to rape her?" Laurie slapped his hand away. "Before you hit her? Before you kicked her? That isn't the way you treat peaches?"

One of the men sighed, "Miss Juspeczyk..." while the other, sensing the oncoming incident, said, "Somebody get her boyfriend."

Eddie, on the other hand, was not ready for this conversation to be over. He knew that someday, if he faced Laurie again, he would have to face her knowing what he did. With it being such public knowledge and all, there was no way that she would not know that it had happened. But there was so much more to it than that time; there had been a time when he had fixed things, a time when he had loved her, a time when they had been together, a time when he had messed things up for himself again, and so many times that he had wanted to fix it again.

"Kid, are you sure you wanna take this all the way?" he asked, and he was almost prepared to tell her the truth, Sally's opinions be damned. Laurie was an adult now, and she deserved to know the truth.

"Damn straight. Damn straight I do!" She snarled. "I mean, what kind of man _are_ you, you have to take some woman, you have to force her into having sex against her will..." She trailed off, the alcohol clouding her mind enough that she needed a moment to figure out what she would say next, but Eddie did not give her that moment.

"Only once." His voice was sad, sadder than he had expected it to sound, because he was still not fucking over it. No matter how many times he said he was and how many times he believed it, he was still not over Sally Jupiter and the family they never had and the life they never had, and now his daughter stood in front of him and hated him and didn't even know who he really was, and he would never have a chance with her and he would never have a chance with her mother.

All he had were memories of a few times he had almost not fucked everything up for himself, but he couldn't even share those memories with anyone, least of all the one person he wanted to know about them. Laurie would always hate him and would always know him based on one mistake in his youth. She would never know about the romance, and she would never even know about his other mistakes. All she knew him by was that one time, and he was her goddamn father.

Of course, she did not realize the weight behind his words and they only served to make her angrier. Enraged, she threw her drink in his face, the sting of the alcohol burning his eyes and the liquid extinguishing his cigar. Eddie didn't see Dr. Manhattan come over and take her away as he dabbed at his eyes with a napkin handed to him by someone; he opened his eyes to the remainder of a flash, the two of them already gone.

He and the others had a good laugh about the erratic behavior of the drunk woman, none of them actually mentioning the implications of what she had said about him. It was easier than he thought to pretend that what she had said hadn't bothered him, and that he saw her as nothing more than a silly girl, trying to throw her weight around in a group of men, and everyone believed the few tears they saw were caused by the drink getting into his eyes.

~X~

Sometime the next year, he received news that Nelson Gardner had died in a car accident, completely decapitated. The fact that Captain Metropolis had been brought down by a car accident of all things was too funny, considering the life-and-death situations he had evaded so many times before, and what Eddie recalled about the nature of his love life.

He remembered when he had discovered the identities of the Minutemen, and how he had planned on getting revenge on them for what had happened. That all seemed to pointless now; he was old enough not to give a shit about being thrown out of a group of men in costumes and he knew damn well that the only person to blame for Sally was him.

It would have been understandable to be upset with Hollis Mason still, for exposing all he had in that book, but even he didn't seem worth Eddie's time anymore. Laurie had been the first person in a long time to confront him about that, and she likely would have found out anyway, and there was no one else whose opinion really mattered to him in the first place.

She would have hated him with or without Hollis' book, and so Eddie didn't care about what Hollis chose to say. The man had never done much talking out back when it mattered, and the fact that he waited until so late to speak showed just how much good his words really did.

But with Nelson now dead, Eddie was the only remaining former member of the Minutemen who was still active, and the thought still gave him some satisfaction, knowing that they had thrown him out only for him to become the best of them. Whatever the hell that even meant.


	23. Chapter 23

The country was abuzz when President Nixon began to talk of putting through a new bill that changed the law about president's running for more than two terms. He claimed that, in times like these with such extreme circumstances, that the change was not only possible, but necessary. And many were eager to agree with him; he had always been aggressively against Communism, had based campaigns around that, and much progress had been made under him.

Eddie didn't mind, of course. Much of his work had been helping Dick out, and he had been able to do a hell of a lot more under him than he would have been able to under anyone else. It was a better living than most people had, and a better living than any of the other costumed adventurers from his day had, and that was enough for him. Of course he would support another four years of getting to do the same.

He figured once Dick was finally done, whenever that would end up being, was when he would retire. If Dick ever retired or the country ever stopped voting for him, which would surely be a few years down the road, then Eddie would allow himself to give it up and try his hand at a more peaceful life. He ignored the fact that he wouldn't even begin to know how that worked.

The excitement that followed Dick's announcement all but covered up another interesting bit of news: Ozymandias had announced his own retirement and would be hanging up his mask for good. Along with that, he had released his true identity, that of a rich, young businessman named Adrian Veidt.

Eddie had suspected the connection between them before, given the height, build, and hair matched so perfectly, but it hadn't really mattered before. It was satisfying to know that he had been right all along though, and that got him to thinking about the others, and who they were.

Obviously, Dr. Manhattan had already come out about things, and even if he hadn't known about Laurie, Sally hadn't kept her own identity a secret and didn't bother with secrecy with her daughter either. But Nite Owl, and especially Rorschach, were still complete mysteries to him, and he had never liked not knowing things. At the very least, investigating them would give him something to do on his downtime.

Both would be tricky, as both had mastered the vigilante art of vanishing when they needed to, but Eddie had his own tricks. He knew how to follow someone without them knowing and he knew how to gather a lot of information based on one very small piece of it. There were things he knew about Nite Owl that he could use to his advantage, such as the fact that he and Hollis Mason had to be friends.

And Hollis Mason didn't keep his life a secret, working openly as a mechanic. It would be easy to drop in and visit him, and even easier to do so when he wasn't around to know he was being visited, which was exactly what Eddie did. Once he was in, he searched the place, ignoring the loud barking of the older man's dog.

Hollis had a lot of tapes, all of them labeled 'answering machine', followed by dates. Of course he would be the type to keep such things, and Eddie was sure there was some sort of information on the new Nite Owl to be found in these. He snagged the ones from 1962, doing his best to leave the home looking undisturbed.

During his down time, he listened to the tapes, waiting for a call that didn't pertain to car repairs. There was a message from Sally that he was quick to skip over, not wanting to hear her voice or whatever it was she had to say to Hollis. Finally, he reached a recording from a voice he recognized, a voice that he was sure belonged to the new Nite Owl.

He sounded nervous in his first message, saying that he had a business question before leaving his number. That would have been enough for Eddie to find him off of, but he decided to keep listening, just in case he revealed his name in a future message, making things a little bit easier.

He cycled through dozens more messages about cars before he heard the young man's voice again, but this time, he gave away everything Eddie needed to know. "Hello, Hollis, this is Dan, uh, Dan Dreiberg. Something's come up and I won't be able to make it at the time we discussed, so if you could give me a call, that'd be great. Thanks."

So this Nite Owl's name was Dan Dreiberg, huh? With a name and a number, finding an address wouldn't be hard. Once he had an address, he could confirm it was the same man, and then that would be that. With one out of the way, that only left Rorschach to figure out.

He wouldn't be easy, considering Eddie had no face to go off of, and he was even better at vanishing than Nite Owl. Not only that, but he would probably be good at figuring out if he was being followed or not, testing even Eddie's stealth abilities. It wasn't an easy job, and all he could do was attempt to tail the younger man and see where it got him.

One night, he got his start by finding Rorschach on his patrol and begun to tail him early on. At that point, if he were caught, it would be easy to write it off as being on a patrol of his own. He didn't think Rorschach disliked him for any reason, and probably trusted him more than some of the others would have.

As the night wore on, it seemed that Eddie was undetected, and eventually, he followed Rorschach to an apartment building, which the man entered by scaling the building and climbing through a window. Eddie waited outside for a while, but he did not return, and he realized that that must be where he lived. Why he didn't just take off his mask and walk in the front door like a normal person?

Eddie counted the floors and figured where the window was, deciding he would come back later to investigate the apartment when he had the chance. He had a pretty good idea of how late Rorschach liked to patrol, and could be in and out before he returned any night.

But on the night that he went, though he had no trouble getting into the apartment that he had seen Rorschach go into, he could not find anything worth looking into. The place was a mess, but there was hardly anything in it. There were few personal items that he could find, and even less that could put an identity to the vigilante. Eventually, he got bored trying to find something, and gave up, heading out.

Obviously, whoever Rorschach was, he wasn't much of anybody. He lived in a shitty apartment, and didn't own much of anything, and couldn't amount to much of anything outside of the mask. If he was that much of a nobody, then Eddie decided he didn't care about finding out who he was; it probably didn't matter anyway.

~X~

Yet, as the year drug on, there were changes in Rorschach's behavior that would almost be concerning to Eddie if he gave a shit. He was more violent, more brutal, more downright murderous than before, and certainly more so than the others had been. Even Eddie hadn't killed that frequently, except, perhaps, in his teenage years.

Something had changed the man and not for the better. He had been investigating a kidnapping for a while, had been very diligent in following up on it. Eddie had been following up on his own case, the first one assigned to him in the city in a while, and had run into Nite Owl and heard about it from him. All he had heard after that was that things had not ended well, and now Rorschach was suddenly exhibiting even more erratic behavior than before. He was sure that the two had to be connected.

The city was not reacting well to him behaving in such a way, however, and they weren't happy with how Nite Owl's gadgets made him more effective than any police officer could hope to be. Eddie had always had his critics, but when people began to speak out against other heroes, they spoke out about him as well, and tensions were rising all around.

Every day, there seemed to be something in the news about how people were not happy with vigilantes or how cops were beginning to feel obsolete. In '76 there was also an interview in some magazine, something hero-related that had nothing to do with the current tension; rather, it was a blast from the past.

Sally Jupiter answered questions about her life and stints as the Silk Spectre, and Eddie heard that he had been mentioned in it, but he didn't so much as glance at the issue of the magazine that it was in.


	24. Chapter 24

It wasn't until the police strike in 1977 that the tension regarding vigilantes reached its peak, and that was when Dick informed Eddie that a bill outlawing costumed crime fighting, something that had been discussed many times in the past and had been actively lobbied for by Senator Keene for the past two years, was almost definitely going to be put into place as a result.

This would not affect him, though; because he was directly serving the government, he would be exempt from that, and anyone else who wanted to register with the government and serve as an agent would be given consideration. Until it was completed and put into place, however, the police were refusing to work, claiming that the vigilantes could handle things on their own.

As a result of that, there were riots in New York, as well as Washington, and no one to keep the people under control. Since Eddie was already in New York, he was given instructions to do what he could about the situation, and potentially go down to Washington later, if the need arose. He was told to do whatever was necessary to quell the riots and work with the other vigilantes if needed, but under no circumstances was the conflict to become lethal.

So, armed to the teeth with nothing that could really kill, he decided it was time to put some of the knowledge he had gathered about his fellow heroes two years ago to good use. Dan Dreiberg still lived at the same address, and Eddie had done his fair share of snooping around the place in the past. There was a basement where he kept everything, including his little airship, and that was where Eddie waited for him that night.

When Dan came downstairs, not yet in costume, he looked ready to have a heart attack when he saw the Comedian lazily leaning against a wall. Eddie smirked at him, though it was hard to tell his expression with his new mask, and said, "Evening, Dan. Gettin' ready to take on those nasty rioters?"

"Did the government send you?" asked Dan, cutting to the chase.

"Nah, they don't know anymore about ya than anyone else. Figuring you out was just a little pet project I gave myself a couple years back." He chuckled. "But they did tell me I had to help out on the streets, and I figured, who better to help me cover more ground than a guy with an airship? So, whaddaya say?"

He contemplated it for a moment, but there was really nothing to contemplate. When someone like the Comedian revealed he knew all there was to know about you, there wasn't much option other than to give him what he wanted. Dan nodded and said, "Sure, sounds like a plan. Just give me a minute to change and then we can head out."

He disappeared for a moment, returning in full costume and leading Eddie on board. Within moments, they had taken off, cruising down a tunnel and emerging somewhere a short distance away. He had to hand it to Dan; he certainly knew how to pull all the stops out. When they were airborne, he pulled out a cigar, but groaned when he realized he had somehow forgotten his lighter.

"Ya got a lighter in here?" he asked, scanning a series of buttons with various symbols. Seeing one with flames on it, he said, "Never mind, found it," and reached to press the button.

"No, no!" said Dan, stopping him. "That's, uh, that's not a lighter, it's a flamethrower."

"Oh. Well then," replied Eddie with a chuckle. "Still sounds like my kinda thing."

Conversation disappeared after that, and the two scanned the streets for disturbances. Eventually, he and Dan found what they were looking for in the form of a very aggressive crowd, picketing and vandalizing and causing a disturbance in every sense of the word. Dan brought the ship in low, hanging above the crowd. Immediately, they were noticed, and the crowd turned their attention to them, shouting and carrying on and even throwing things.

"Lemme out," said Eddie, nodding at the window. "I think I better deal with them face to face." Dan looked ready to protest, but didn't, pressing a button to open one of the windows. Eddie climbed out then and the window shut behind him as he steadied himself on the front of the ship. The crowd only got more riled up at that.

Over a speaker, Dan started to try to reason with them. "Please, if everybody will just clear the streets..." But no one was listening to him or, if they were, they did not plan on complying.

Eddie did not bother with trying to remain civil with the crowd. "Listen, you little punks, ya better get back in your rat holes!" he shouted. "I got riot gas, I got rubber bullets-ach!" He was cut off by someone throwing something at him- a crushed soda can that he didn't see in time to catch it. "Okay, that does it."

Everyone was yelling at once, but he could hear a few of the voices above the others in the crowd. One woman shouted, "You pig! You call yourself a comedian? You're a pig anna rapist!" while an older man said, "We don't want vigilantes! We want regular cops!" to which another woman added, "My son is a police officer, you faggots!"

They were all annoying as hell, talking like they knew anything, like most of them didn't owe their lives to him or another hero somewhere. Eddie wasn't one to defend a dying trend, but he also wasn't one to sit around and listen to people talk shit when they didn't know shit, and he reached for one of the grenades clipped to his waist.

Pulling out the pin with his teeth, he muttered, "...two potato, three potato, four potato! Heads up!" He chucked it into the crowd just as the tear gas burst forth.

"God, look, I'm sorry," said Dan, still on speaker. "You haven't left us any choice. This stuff is dangerous, please clear the streets."

Eddie put on a gas mask he had been given along with the grenades, and leaped down from the ship. A ladder fell from the bottom and Dan climbed down, also wearing a gas mask. "Comedian, this is a nightmare! This whole city is erupting. How long can we keep this up?"

Ignoring the question, he laughed. "Ha! Look at 'em. Run, you suckers!" he called after the rioters.

"Comedian? I said-"

"I heard what you said," he replied. "My government contacts tell me some new act is being herded through. Until then, we're society's only protection. We keep it up as long as we have to."

"Protection?" Dan asked. "Who are we protecting them from?"

"From themselves." He sneered, but his mask hid it. "Whatsa matter? Don't you feel comfortable unless you're up against some schmuck in a Halloween suit?" Snickering, he didn't give Dan a chance to answer before going for next question. "Speakin' o' which, where the hell are Rorschach an' the others?"

"Jon and Laurie are handling the riots in Washington. Rorschach's across town, trying to hold the lower east side. He, uh, he mostly works on his own these days..."

"Rorschach's nuts," said Eddie simply as the two walked on. "He's been nuts ever since that kidnapping he handled three years back. Him, Byron Lewis, Jon Goddamn Walking H-Bomb Osterman...all nuts."

"But not you?" asked Dan, not without a bit of resentment.

"No. Not me. I keep things in proportion an' try to see the funny side," he said, then spotted someone with a can of spray paint, vandalizing a wall. He drew his gun. "Drop that can, you little freak!" He fired and they ran for it.

He and Dan walked up to the wall, where an unfinished message was displayed. _Who watches the watchm_ , with a half-finished e at the end. "Ha! You see this? I seen that written up all over durin' the last two weeks. They don't like us an' they don't _trust_ us."

Dan looked almost hurt by the graffiti and said, "This whole situation...it's horrible."

Again, Eddie snickered. "Well, me, I kinda like it when things get weird, ya know? I like it when all the cards were on the table." It was true that he was enjoying himself, but that had less to do with the weirdness of the situation, and more to do with the fact that, as long as he did not kill anyone, he could terrorize as many civilians as he wanted with no repercussions.

"But the country's _disintegrating_ ," protested Dan, almost whining. "What's happened to America? What's happened to the American dream?"

Once again, Eddie offered up a sneer that the other man could not even see. "It came true. You're lookin' at it," he replied, hooking a thumb over his shoulder, pointing to where the crowds had run off to. "Now, c'mon, let's really put these jokers through some changes!"

And that was how they spent the rest of the night, chasing around rioters until the streets were mostly empty. Dan kept quiet after that, not sure how to process what he had seen and heard, not sure how to feel about his actions or the actions of his companion. Eddie, on the other hand, had a blast. His teenage self would have enjoyed the wanton havoc he had the chance to deliver that night, and he resolved to live the night to the fullest, if only for old times' sake.

Eventually, Dan made his excuses, saying that he wanted to make sure Rorschach was doing alright on his own, and Eddie saw no need to keep wandering the streets by himself. The situation was calm for now, and he was sure there would be few rioters who would want to cross paths with him in the future.

~X~

When the Keene Act was passed, only he and Dr. Manhattan were given the free pass, both being employed by the government. No other heroes stepped forward for approval; Laurie retreated into her home life with Jon and Dan seemed to plan on retiring. Rorschach, on the other hand, both refused to retire and refused to cooperate with the government, and continued to practice illegally.

The age of the hero was over. Even with Eddie still working under his alias of nearly forty years, he knew that it was over. Jon Osterman was no hero, and Eddie had never been one himself, certainly wasn't one now. He didn't really give a shit about any of it anymore; it had been a hobby once, and then a job, an excuse sometimes, but it had never been who he was.

He could be Eddie Blake or he could be the Comedian, and it didn't matter as long as he carried out his work. The Keene Act only made that more apparent, and though he still wore the mask, it was only because Nixon liked the image of an American hero. He might have realized that the image was nothing but a joke, or he might not have, but he had no intention of letting it go just yet, even as it fell out of favor.


	25. Chapter 25

By the time Dick won his fourth term, Eddie was less of a hero and more of his lapdog, running around and taking on whatever missions needed, and by the time Dick won an unbelievable fifth term, Eddie was hardly even that. He barely had any work given to him, and was mostly seen as a last resort.

That was fine by him. It was 1985, and he was turning sixty one. He had been at this for over forty years, and though he was still fit and could still give most anyone one hell of a fight, he was old, and there were times when he just didn't feel like giving them that fight. Everyone needed a rest sometimes, even from something they loved.

So that was Eddie's life over the years after the Keene Act was passed. He began to spend more time back in New York, in his nice apartment that he had barely lived in during the height of his career. Alone, more often than not, but that was how things had always been for him, and he was used to it. He could have gone out and gotten someone to make the night a little less lonely; he was not bad on the eyes for a man of his age if you disregarded the scar, and he always had enough money to hire a prostitute. But he found that that wasn't even the sort of company he wanted anymore.

He couldn't exactly hire a woman to just sit and listen to him talk about nothing or watch television with him- at least, he couldn't if he wanted to keep his dignity in tact. And where did all the domestic bullshit come from anyway? He could have had that before, and he chose not to, so he sure as hell didn't need it now. Zoey or Anh, either one of them could have played the part of a wife, or at least a friend, and he chose not to. He chose not to have that sort of life.

Except he hadn't chosen with Sally, and maybe that was the problem, but he never let himself think about that for long. He had let himself think about that too many times already, and it had been a long time since he had even seen her, longer still since he had missed that chance. If he still loved her after all this time, that was not something he was going to admit to himself.

~X~

Sometimes there were missions, though, and sometimes there were times when he would go do whatever was needed of him, wherever he was needed. It was South America a lot lately, and Nicaragua was just another spot on the map to visit. They all started to feel the same after a bit, and he didn't even care about the specifics. He was in and he was out, and then it was time to wait at home until the next one came along.

But then he was on his way home, and something was different. He had only glanced out of the airship window, but it had been enough to catch sight of an island, and he didn't know what the island was called, so he tried to look at it on a map, but it wasn't there, and then he couldn't get it out of his head.

What the hell sort of island was just sitting out there, not existing on any maps? Obviously, there was something going on there that shouldn't be; it was the only explanation, and as a government agent- even one that barely saw action these days- he knew he had to figure out what the deal was.

He made plans to go back, telling only Dick what he suspected, and Dick gave him the resources he needed, without telling any of the men he sent what the purpose of their mission was. Eddie was going in alone, but that was how he liked it; no need to let anyone else make things messy or fuck things up for him. He was instructed only to gather information, nothing else; he couldn't start a fight until they had all the information and the president had made a decision.

Of course, he would have been fine with going in in the dead of night and fucking up everyone and everything that he saw, but his subordinance had only grown in his old age and for once he was content to do as he was told. When he drew close to the island, sent on a boat this time, he had to swim the rest of the way.

His costume was heavy in water- and it didn't make sense that he had to wear it, since he was not supposed to be seen on this mission either way- but he was still strong, and he reached the island with ease. Upon first glance, it appeared to be some kind of resort, but he didn't but that. What sort of resort opened on an island that didn't exist?

He wasn't going to leave until he had investigated further, and it didn't take him long to find something more going on there. There were files and lists, presumably of residents, and all of them had something special about them, but they didn't all fit together in any way he could understand. There were artists and writers, but there were scientists as well, and people with no occupation given.

Who were all of these people, and what were they doing here? After a bit more searching, he found labs. He didn't pretend to understand the things he saw while he was sneaking around, but he found more files there, and though they still hardly made sense, he was beginning to piece things together. With just a few more files, a few more labs, a few more bits on information, the big picture began to form in his mind.

But there was no way, there was absolutely no way it could be true. What they were doing here, it couldn't really be that, that wasn't possible, and no one would be crazy enough to think that it was. It was all just a madman's pipe dream, and somehow he had managed to convince others to help him try to achieve the impossible. It was fucking terrifying, but it wasn't real, it was no threat; all Eddie had to do was tell Dick what was going on, and it would all be gone in no time.

A sinking feeling told him to leave then and there, to not investigate further. He told himself he would not find anything else, though the sinking feeling only suggested that he already knew he would and that he would not like what he found. He wanted to leave but he pressed on, ignoring the sense of dread that he could not shake. And that was when he found it there, big and horrific and all too real.

And he knew then, that this was not a pipe dream, and he knew then, that this was really going to happen and that it was going to happen soon, and that the madman behind it all had practically done it already. Eddie had to get out of there, he had to try to forget what he saw, because the image of that _thing_ was going to haunt him for that much longer if he did not get away from it.

Before he left, however, he went through one last set of files, one last bit of information. He had dug deep enough at last to discover the madman in question, the one behind the whole thing. But the madman in question- and he supposed it all made sense, given the man's intellect and wealth and resources- was not just anyone. The one behind it all was Adrian Veidt.


	26. Chapter 26

It was impossible to process what he had seen, but it was also impossible to forget, to just store away. He knew that he was supposed to report it, and he knew that he was lucky he had seen it when he did. Now it could be stopped in time; now no one would have to face that horror.

But he couldn't do. No matter how well he knew that he had to do it, he just couldn't do it. He told Nixon it was a rich guy's private island, and even managed to drag up a few very well-obscured records that indicated just that. Veidt had been incredibly good at covering his tracks.

Eddie was not able to tell Dick, or anyone else, what was going on, because he was afraid. He was not afraid that they would write him off as crazy, he was afraid that they would believe him, and that they would stop it. Which he supposed did make him crazy, because he knew it needed to be stopped, but there was a part of him that realized that, for all the madness, the plan had merit.

And, oh, how he hated to admit that Veidt was right about anything, but especially about this. He hated to think that something this awful, this _horrific_ could be right, but there was a part of him that knew that it would work. If everything went the way he planned it, it would work, and that was terrifying, but if they did _nothing_...

He had spent years ignoring the way the world was heading, and even more years pretending that he did not care, that it did not affect him, but he could not keep his eyes closed to it anymore. Not after what he had seen, not now that he knew just how close they were, and just how close they were to a solution. A horrible solution, but a solution nonetheless.

The only problem was that it might not go perfectly to plan. There were aspects of it that frightened him almost as much as the plan itself, things that involved pushing Dr. Manhattan away, and that was another thing that he had tried to ignore, but that he knew was a real problem. A man with that much power, and they were going to push him like that? If they were wrong, the effects could be just as devastating as war.

He couldn't keep quiet, but he couldn't tell anyone that could stop it. It was simply not a possibility anymore; he would not be reporting what he had seen. But it was so damn hard, sitting by himself in his apartment, with absolutely no one to talk to, and it really hit him just how goddamn lonely he was.

It wasn't the first time he had seen himself as lonely, but it seemed so much worse now, so much heavier, and the weight of his need to _talk_ to someone threatened to crush him. But he had alienated himself so much, pushed away anyone he could have had a chance of being friends with, had done so much to ensure that he would end up just like this; isolated and alone. The worst of it was, it came as a second nature to him, and he didn't think he could have stopped himself from being that way if he tried. Why was he the way he was? Why had he been so terrible with people that he now had no one to talk to when he really needed it?

He drank more heavily in those days after he returned to the states, trying to block it out of his mind. It never helped much, and never for long, and when he came out of it, it was always worse than before. He couldn't do this alone, but there was nobody in the world that he could count on.

He remembered Moloch, then. Moloch, who had been a regular target in his heyday as a super hero. Moloch, the villain he had always considered a constant in his life, someone that he could count on. He had been put away once and for all over a decade ago and had made an effort to turn his life around in prison. Edgar Jacobi had allegedly emerged a changed man, but had remained on a watch list and would be very easy to find.

And there was the fact that he was a part of this too. He was a part of the plan, specifically the part that was there to push Manhattan. Moloch would be dying soon because of that plan, and Eddie was sure he had no idea what he was involved with. It was too late to warn him or save him, of course, but it was not too late to go talk to him, at least for old time's sake.

~X~

He had staggered to Jacobi's address, letting himself in as if he were an old friend who knew the place well. The man was asleep and didn't wake up at first, even as Eddie entered his room. He had come in costume, because it had seemed appropriate, but his mask was so damn uncomfortable that night, and he was too drunk to care if Jacobi saw his face.

So he sat down at the foot of the bed and took his mask off, holding it in his hands. He noticed the man stirring, and said, "It's a joke. S'all a joke." Jacobi looked positively terrified to see the Comedian of all people in his bedroom, but he did not say anything, so Eddie continued. "I mean, lemme tell ya, when I started out, when I was a kid, cleanin' up the waterfronts, it was, like, real easy. The world was tough, you just hadda be tougher, right? Not anymore."

He stood, walking alongside the bed and approaching Jacobi. "I mean, I thought I knew how it was, how the world was. But then I found out about this gag, this joke...you're a part of it, Moloch, ol' pal. Ya know that?"

Eddie got in close then, grabbing Jacobi by the front of his pajamas and staring him dead in the eyes. "If I thought you _did_ know...I saw your name on the list, you and Janey Slater, but if I thought you were in on this, I'd kill you. You understand? _Kill you_." He then sighed and dropped him, walking back the way he had come.

"I mean, you fought that big blue geek! You know what his head's like! I tellya, who knows which way he'll jump if anybody messes with him...he might...he might just..." He trailed off, waving his arms around to emphasize what he could not say. "Nah, I don' wanna think about it. I don' wanna _think_ about it. Doncha got any booze in this place?"

While he began to search a dresser, he continued rambling, despite the fact that Jacobi had yet to say a thing. "I mean, what gets me, right? What gets _me_ , I need never have looked outta the airship window at that moment, never seen the goddamn island, never got involved." Finding what he was looking for, he removed a bottle from the dresser. "Ha! There ya are, ya sumbitch..."

He had already had more than enough to drink that night, but he downed the contents of the bottle and then exhaled. "It stinks. It all stinks. I mean, this joke, I mean, I thought _I_ was the Comedian, ya know?"

"Oh, God, I can't _believe_ it. I can't believe anybody would _do_ that." Eddie sat back down, once again overcome by the weight of it all. "I can't...I can't believe..." His head dropped into his hands and his shoulders shook. He was crying, and then he was sobbing, something he had felt like doing every since he had figured this damn mess out.

"Oh, Jesus, look at me. I'm _cryin'_ , and you don't _know_. You don't know what's _happening_." He stood up again, staring out the window for a second before turning his attention back to the dresser, this time looking at what was on it. "On that island, they got writers, scientists, artists, and what they're _doing_..."

On the wall, there was a crucifix, and on top of the dresser, there was a small statue of Mary. Jacobi was Catholic, just as Eddie had been raised to be. "I mean, I done some bad things. I did bad things to women, I shot kids! In 'Nam, I shot kids, but I never did anything like, like..."

Once again giving into tears, he dropped to his knees, grabbing for the statue, holding it close to him and pleading with it. "Oh, Mother. Oh, forgive me. Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me..."

He stood up, struggling to steady himself, and approached Jacobi once again. "I mean, what's funny? What's so goddamned _funny_? I don't _get_ it. Somebody explain..."

Eddie grabbed at his pajamas like before, but this time, he was not threatening him. This time, he was pleading with him for an answer that he would never get. "Somebody _explain_ it to me," he begged.

But still, Jacobi did not speak. Too scared or too confused or both, and Eddie should have realized that coming here wouldn't have solved anything. He could pretend that he wasn't alone in this but he was, and that was that. Talking to Moloch didn't change that, and he had no one else in the world that he could talk to.

Sighing, he put his mask back on and went home.

~X~

October 12th, 1985. It had been weeks since he had made his discovery, and since he had visited Jacobi in one last futile attempt to feel better about things. It hadn't gotten any better for him after that, of course, and on that night, he found himself alone, again. Alone, like always.

And that was how it would be, for however long he lived after this. He didn't know when the attack would happen, and even if he did, he wasn't sure if he would have bothered to go somewhere else or not. What would it matter if he did? He would just keep on, as he was, alone. Maybe it would be fine it all ended soon.

He had never imagined himself thinking like that, had never pegged himself as a quitter when he had always known himself to be a fighter, but this was different. This changed everything, and made him realize just how pointless it had been. All of it, every bit of his life, had been meaningless, and he realized that now more than ever.

He had been a hero. For the majority of his life, he had been a hero, but he had never meant it. It had been a joke to him, just like the rest of his life, just like everything. He had always treated it all like a joke and pushed everyone away, and no one really knew who he was. Hell, he didn't know who he was now, and he tried pinning his signature button to his bathrobe that night to make himself feel more like a hero, but it didn't work. He was still just a joke, but his laugh was so forced that he cut it off prematurely.

It had really all been meaningless, hadn't it? He didn't want it to be, and he tried to think of something, anything that made his life count for something, and only one thing came to mind, and that was his family that never was. Laurie, who was out there hating him and just as in danger as everyone else and his daughter, and Sally, the love of his life that he still couldn't let go of, that he knew he couldn't let go of even if he pretended that he already had. He didn't even know where she lived nowadays; they could both die, and they would both die hating him.

They were the only people who had ever mattered to him. Not Zoey, not Anh, not Dick, not the Minutemen, just Sally and Laurie, and that meant something. Even if the rest of his life didn't mean anything, that did, and he knew that he had to do something before time was up. He had to find them, he had to explain things to Laurie, he had to make it up to Sally, he had to make it up to both of them, and then he had to warn them.

It had been too late for so long, but even so, he would do it. He would at least try, and even if they pushed him away again, he could at least save them and he could at least say that he tried to fix things. He could at least try for the only thing that had ever mattered about his life.

With this new resolve, he felt something he hadn't felt in a long time, something that was almost akin to hope. Life was shit, but he had a plan of his own now, and everything would be better.

But then his door was kicked open, and Eddie realized that he had already lost his chance at that.


End file.
